by Leslie Cox; Wednesday, February 19, 2014

Nothing like working in the garden in the rain! Boy, it poured down for a while yesterday afternoon. But it did not deter us from installing Speedibin composters at three of the schools in my Green Sprouts School Garden Program. Very exciting!

And we will be installing two more Speedibin composters at the last two schools in a few days.

Through very generous donations from the Comox Valley Horticultural Society’s (CVHS) Gardens in Bloom Garden Tour and from the Comox Valley Growers and Seed Savers (CVGSS), five of the schools in the program were able to purchase a rodent-resistant Speedibin composter for their school gardens. I should also mention, we received a lovely discount on the composters from the company, Earth Fresh Products. Bless them.

Composting is a very necessary function in the gardening process and one that the students embrace. Up until now, we have been relying on the black cone composters at the schools. Most classes have their own compost buckets into which the students put their apple cores, orange peels, egg shells, etc. Unfortunately, the black cone composters are really only designed to handle the amount of refuse generated by a family of four to five…not that of an institution the size of a school. It was a battle to be sure.

Now that we have the Speedibin composter, it is hoped the students will undertake to manage their compost with a little more attention to the proper carbon to nitrogen ratio of 30:1. The new composters should also make it easier for the students to aerate the compost, aiding in producing a lovely soil amendment for their garden beds in record time.

But the very best part about the Speedibin composters…all the worms!! Oodles and oodles of them! You never saw such excitement from a bunch of kids. Absolutely wonderful!

Thank you Comox Valley Horticultural Society, Comox Valley Growers and Seed Savers and Joyce McMenamon of Earth Fresh Products! And thank you to my husband, John, for the help in installing the composters…

…and also to our puppy, Sadie, for her vary able help in gathering up some compostable materials to get the Speedibin composters up and running.

 

 

 

For more information about the Speedibin composter please visit their website: www.speedibin.com

For more about the Comox Valley Horticultural Society please visit their website: www.comoxvalleyhortsociety.ca

For more information about Comox Valley Growers and Seed Savers please visit their website: www.cvgss.org