...according to environmental experts You?ve ditched plastic straws for metal ones, stocked up on reusable food containers, and swapped out your old cleaning products for organic alternatives. The next logical step in your eco-warrior journey is taking on composting.
According to Rebecca Louie, founder of the Compostess website and author of Compost City, ?composting is the human version of re-creating what mother nature does out in the wild: taking a controlled space and mixing together various organic materials in magical cocktails or recipes appropriate to the system.? The result, compost, is a soil additive so rich in plant nutrients that it?s nicknamed ?black gold.?
The ?recipes? Louie mentions are combinations of carbon-based ?browns? (cardboard, paper, sawdust, or wood chips), nitrogen-rich ?greens? (food scraps like apple cores or banana peels), water, and air. Over time, bacteria breaks down the scraps to create compost and you end up with about 50 percent less trash. There are systems you can use to make this process happen at home, but if you prefer, you can just collect your food scraps and drop them off at a location listed at GrowNYC. For the best ways to compost at home, we spoke to Louie; Marisa DeDominicis, co-founder and executive director of environmental nonprofit Earth Matter NY; George Pisegna, Deputy Director and Chief of Horticulture at the New York Horticultural Society; Diane Miessler, Author of Grow Your Soil; Sandy Nurse, founder and co-...