Composting Methods Compared

How To Compost: A Complete Comparison Of The Best Composting Methods For UK Gardeners (Including Cold, Hot, Bokashi & Vermicomposting).

Composting is easy. In fact, stopping organic matter from decomposing is very difficult. From the point of view of our veg, we dry, freeze, chill, pickle etc all as means to stop our veg from rotting. So why is it that so many people struggle to make compost?

Low Cost Gardening Techniques Using Compost Bins / How To Source Organic Matter For Composting — Low Cost Gardening Techniques Using Compost Bins .. see Composting Methods Compared

The answer is probably because they overthink it with worries about carbon:nitrogen ratios, because so many sources say you have to balance the greens and browns. The reality is that trees rot and their trunks are mainly carbon/browns. And grass mowings rot, and they are high nitrogen and low carbon. The trees take a long time, and the grass mowings go slimy, but both rot in time. And if you mix the two types just a bit, things improve.

So making compost is a natural process, that we can speed up if we want to, but it will happen in most cases anyway. It is the natural ways life gets recycled and is almost impossible to stop.

In the next few paragraphs I’m going to go through the basics of some of the many ways that compost can be made. In some cases without any expensive equipment. It only starts to cost money if you want to speed the process up. But patience is free .. and I am prepared to wait in most cases.

Traditional Cold Composting (Bins & Heaps)

This is the classic, laid-back method you’ll see in gardens up and down the country. You simply pile up your organic waste in a corner 9no equipment needed!), a homemade bay (maybe from old pallets), or one of those black ‘dalek’ bins the council often sell on the cheap. Nature then takes its sweet time, with bacteria, fungi and small animals of various sorts doing all the hard work for you. It’s the definition of low-effort gardening.

Traditional Cold Composting Pros:

Easy and Cheap: It’s a doddle to start and uses simple kit, making it perfect for beginners or if you’re not bothered about speed .
Chill: There’s no need for constant turning or fussing. You just add to it as and when.
Big Appetite: This method can handle a good amount of garden waste, like leaves, clippings, and woody prunings, all in one go.

Traditional Cold Composting Cons:

A Right Slowcoach: It can take from 9 to a full 12 months, or even up to 3 years, for the compost to be ready .
Doesn’t Kill the Baddies: It won’t get hot enough to kill weed seeds, roots, or nasty pathogens. This means you could end up spreading more weeds around your flowerbeds.
Can Be a Pest Magnet: An open heap can be a bit of a beacon for rats and other unwanted visitors looking for an easy meal and a warm bed.

Here’s a World War II film on making compost. Neither the sulphate of ammonia or lime are strictly necessary … or the cigarette that seems to be permanently attached to the gardener!

Hot Composting (Hot Bins)

This is the high-performance, turbo-charged version. By using an insulated bin (like a ‘Hotbin’ or ‘Green Johanna’) and getting the perfect mix of materials, the microbes inside work so hard that the temperature soars. You can get rich, crumbly compost in just 1-3 months.

Hot Composting Pros:

It’s Quick: You’ll have usable compost in a matter of weeks, not months, and it’s many times faster than the cold method.
Annihilates Weeds: The high heat (40-60°C) kills off weed seeds, diseases, and any insect larvae, giving you top-quality, safe compost.
Eats the Lot: These bins can handle almost any food waste, including cooked food scraps, meat, fish, and even small bones .

Hot Composting Cons:

Needs a Lot of Faffing: You have to be careful with the mix of greens and browns, keep an eye on moisture, and turn it often to keep the air flowing.
Can Be a Bit Pricey: The specialist bins cost a fair bit more than a standard plastic one, though some councils offer a bit of a discount.
Needs a Big Batch: To get the heat going properly, you usually need a fair amount of waste to fill it up in one go. It’s not great for just adding scraps bit by bit.
To overcome the need to obtain a bigger batch of materials in one go I tend to add wood chips to green materials such as lawn mowings. This stone heats up and the woodchip composts quite fast.

See the various hot composting bins available by following this link

Tumbler Composting

Think of a cement mixer for your garden waste. These bins are sealed drums mounted on a frame, which you can spin on an axle to mix the contents. It makes turning a heavy pile an absolute doddle (in theory!).

Tumbler Composting Pros:

Easy Peasy Turning: It takes all the back-breaking work out of aerating your compost. Just a few spins, and you’re done. (Maybe. My experience is unless they are carefully loaded they can be very hard to tumble.
Neat and Tidy: Because it’s off the ground and sealed, it’s much less likely to attract rodents.
Speeds Things Up: Regular mixing and good airflow help the process along faster than a traditional cold heap. BUT to get the air in you do need to open the barrel. Tumbling a sealed container doesn’t add air!

Tumbler Composting Cons:

Fussy Composting: It can be tricky to get the mix of greens and browns exactly right. Too wet, and it clumps into a smelly ball; too dry, and nothing happens.
Not Massive: The capacity is often limited, so it’s not ideal for huge gardens with tonnes of waste.
Can Be a Splurge: They’re more expensive than a basic bin, and some of the cheaper ones can be a bit flimsy.

Worm Composting (Wormeries)

This is a clever indoor or small-space solution. A wormery uses, hungry brandling worms to munch through your kitchen peelings. You end up with two brilliant things: a super-concentrated liquid feed and fantastic, crumbly compost called ‘worm castings’.

Worm Composting (Wormeries) Pros:

Top-Quality Stuff: The compost and liquid feed are packed with nutrients and beneficial microbes, making it pure gold for your plants.
Great for Flats: They’re compact and can be kept in a shed, a garage, or even a utility room (if you’re on top of the maintenance).
Super Fast: Worms work much faster than the microbes in a cold heap, giving you results in just a few months.

Worm Composting (Wormeries) Cons:

A Bit High-Maintenance: Worms need a steady temperature (18-25°C), a specific diet, and you can’t just dump loads of waste in at once, or they’ll get overwhelmed and it’ll start to pong.
Not a Garden Dustbin: They’re really only for kitchen scraps. Garden waste like grass clippings, branches, and tough leaves are a no-go.
Initial Outlay: You’ll need to buy the wormery kit and the worms themselves, which is more of an upfront cost than a simple bin

Here are a selection of Worm bins and Wormeries currently available online.

Bokashi Composting

This one’s a bit different. It’s a two-step, indoor fermentation method that uses a special air-tight bucket and inoculated bran to ‘pickle’ your food waste. The magic is that it can handle all your kitchen scraps, including meat, fish, dairy, and cooked leftovers, without any smells or attracting flies.

Bokashi Composting Pros:

Eats Everything: It’s the only home method that can truly compost your entire kitchen caddy, from veg peelings to that leftover curry.
Odourless and Tidy: The fermentation process is completely smell-free, making it ideal for a kitchen worktop.
Speedy: The fermentation cycle takes only 2-4 weeks, so you can process waste continuously.

Bokashi Composting Cons:

It’s a Pre-Compster: It doesn’t produce finished compost. You get a ‘pre-compost’ that looks like a pickled mush. This has to be buried in a trench or added to a regular bin to fully break down .
Ongoing Costs: You have to keep buying the special Bokashi bran or spray to keep the process going.
Extra Work: It’s a more hands-on process with more steps than just chucking stuff in a bin.

See Bokashi bin prices here

Trench Composting (In-Ground)

This is the ultimate “lazy” method. You simply dig a trench or a hole about a spade’s depth in your veg patch or flowerbed, chuck your kitchen scraps in, and cover it back up with soil . The waste then rots down directly in the ground, feeding the soil right where you need it.

Trench Composting Pros:

Properly Lazy: No bins, no turning, no faff. You just dig a hole and forget about it. It’s often called ‘invisible composting’ for a reason.
No Smell, No Pests: Because it’s buried, there are absolutely no smells to annoy the neighbours and no chance of attracting rats or flies.
Free and Easy: It costs absolutely nothing to do. You don’t need any special gear, just a spade.

Trench Composting Cons:

Hard Work!: You’ll need to be able to dig a decent-sized hole or trench, which can be a real pain if you have heavy clay soil or a bad back.
Not for Lawns: You can’t really do this in the middle of your lawn. It’s best for areas where you’ll be digging the soil over anyway, like a vegetable patch.
Patchy Results: The nutrients are concentrated only where you’ve buried the waste. You’d need to dig lots of trenches to feed a whole garden evenly.