HYDERABAD: Has it ever occurred to you that the waste coming out of your kitchen can be of great use for your plants at home? Yes, you’ve heard it right.
Those scraps and peels which you junk every time you cook can be used to make a rich compost which is a great fertiliser for your plants.
This compost is as good as gold if you are planning on growing a home garden or mini-farm. Many of us buy compost from the market but making it at home won’t cost you a single penny.
Moreover, you will love the fact that you’ve turned waste into wealth. We speak to people in the city who have been doing this for quite some time now. Kalpana Ramesh, a designer, entrepreneur and a water conservationist, shares how she makes her compost. “I have been doing this for almost four years now. Whatever wet waste that comes out of my kitchen, I use it to make compost.
Earlier, I used to use cooked waste as well, but now we have reduced that a lot and stopped wasting cooked food. So, now it is mostly vegetable and fruit peels. I purchased cocopeat online, which is the easiest way to make compost. The task is done in 20-25 days. I make the compost in pots and there is no need to make holes in the pot as there is extra moisture in it. I layer the compost with cocopeat and waste. I do it every day and then cover the pot with a lid or cloth.
Sometimes, I get around one to two kg of compost. We get about 60 to 70 kg of wet waste in a month and so I use it all for making compost. It has been working pretty well and the compost doesn’t smell at all. It works great on my plants.” Also, by making compost at home, one can reduce the carbon footprint, she says. Sarneena Priscilla Isaac, who has also been trying her hand at making composting pits during the lockdown, says, “Just like us, my plants also need nutrition.
Focusing on a no-waste lifestyle, I collect all the peels, pulls, stalks, stems, tea and coffee remains, egg shells and mix it with cow dung that I get from a nearby goshala. I also add into it a few earthworms that I collect after a rainy night and cover it all up with soil. Every day, I top it up with the kitchen waste and a month latr, I have my organic compost to fertilise my plants. This is a stress buster, spending time in my rooftop garden after a long day at work,” she says.
Madhulika Choudhary, founder of Dhruvansh organisation which is works to restore lakes in Hyderabad, talks about the hot and cold composting that she has been doing. “Cold composting is done at a lake where we pile up all leaves, flowers and decomposable puja material and cover it with cow dung. In 90 days, the compost gets ready and can be used for over 60,000 plants that are growing nearby.
The other technique is hot composting which I do at home. I have a clay composter in which I put all the vegetable peels, bio enzymes and add dry leaves and then cover it with a thin layer of cow dung. The compost gets ready in 21-30 days and I never use cocopeat or sawdust. Composting is a natural process and it needs zero investment. I have experimented with plastic containers but I feel the clay composter is better,” she says. Madhulika has also done vermi- composting. “I add maggots or insects and spray homemade bio enzymes, which make everything easy and simple.”
Many of us buy compost from the market but making it at home won’t cost you a single penny. Moreover, you will love the fact that you’ve made wealth out of waste
Tips for making compost by Kalpana
At first, do not add cooked waste. First understand the process of composting
Start with fruit and vegetable peel, try to cut it as small as you can. If you can gather dry leaves, place
them in a bucket
Make holes in your bucket or container that you’re using to make the compost
Cover the container with a cloth to keep flies and insects out
Earthworms make good compost