Only a tiny amount of ash from untreated wood is OK in the home compost pile. Complete your garden shed by building a boardwalk and gate, will grace up your shed too. There are no real directions: just carefully mold some air-dry or oven-bake clay into furniture. Finish with some kind of soft feet. For example, if you live in an apartment, you will be limited to vermicomposting just your kitchen scraps. A perfect storage-friendly side table got by simple slatted arrangements of pallets.

They should look like a square with overlapping corners. Keep stacking them this way until the walls are as high as you want them to be and then add a roof.

If building an outdoor house, make the walls and roof of the fairy house and then cover the whole thing with dirt or mud to make a rounded hobbit-house. Press flat stones into the sides to create walls and add moss to the top to make a thatched roof. Leave a hole where you want the door to be and add a hollow stick, reed, or piece of bamboos to make a chimney.

Press a few pebbles into the dirt leading up to the doorway to make a path of stepping-stones. Part 4 of Create an inside world for the fairies. Cover the floors with sands, leaves, or moss to create soft padding.

Make a hammock from the fronds of a fern or a piece of stocking and add scraps of fabric for curtains. Turn an upside-down teacup or saucer into a table and use acorn caps as bowls. If you want to add furniture, you can either use doll furniture or make your own: [5] X Research source To make a table, for example, gather some dry twigs, both skinny and thick, from your backyard. When this has dried, lay twigs across the top and glue them to the frame. When the top has dried, cut four pieces to the same length and glue them underneath to form the table legs.

Clay furniture is much easier to make but does not look as rustic. There are no real directions: just carefully mold some air-dry or oven-bake clay into furniture. Decorate the house with your findings. Once you have made your structure, you can decorate it with doors, vines, etc.

Rustic and natural features will seem more realistic. Birch tree bark has a beautiful look and you can use both sides. Don't forget to include landscaping! I made a house 3 weeks ago and no fairies have come. Am I doing something wrong? You probably aren't doing anything wrong, but you almost certainly won't see the fairies when they come. Try sprinkling some fine glitter around the house to attract the fairies' attention, and putting an acorn cap bowl of crystallized ginger on the table.

Fairies love crystallized ginger. Add a pinch of extra-strong belief, and they are almost guaranteed to come, even if you don't see them. Not Helpful 30 Helpful You could try milk, cream, or butter. Fairies love honey as well. Go for sweet and natural foods as these are their favorites.

Not Helpful 16 Helpful Look for clues like, does the bed look like it has been layed in or are the supplies you left gone? Not Helpful 10 Helpful Not Helpful 25 Helpful You'll need to find tiny hinges, you'll probably be able to find them at a hardware store or a craft store. Not Helpful 29 Helpful You could walk around your neighborhood or Things You Can Make Out Of Wood Easy Images go to a nearby park or forest.

Not Helpful 31 Helpful You can, but it will take a lot of hot glue without a base behind it. If possible, use sticks or cardboard or clay as walls, and use the flower petals and leaves as wallpaper. Not Helpful 20 Helpful If I want to put my fairy house in my bedroom, where is the best place to put it?

Put it up somewhere it won't be disturbed, on a book shelf or dresser would work best. You might have to just use your imagination, but try this - add an acorn cap on top of the table, and put a small snack in it. I used crystalized ginger. It works great! Not Helpful 38 Helpful Build the basic fairy house.

Cover the cardboard with natural items such as sticks, moss or leaves. If you can't get these items, you can cut or print out pictures of the items and cover the house with them. Not Helpful 24 Helpful Include your email address to get a message when this question is answered.

Be sure to add everything you can imagine a fairy would need. You can start by imagining what you'd need like clothes, food plastic, a couch, a table, etc. Now imagine what a fairy would need. Maybe sprinkle some fairy dust here and there?

Get creative! Helpful 2 Not Helpful 0. If building in the woods, outside of your garden or backyard, be sure to use only natural and found objects e.

Helpful 3 Not Helpful 0. Don't use plastic, duct tape, staple gun, hot glue gun, or anything that will make the fairy house intentionally permanent, or a possible hazard to wildlife.

Songbirds, small rodents, amphibians, in addition to gnomes, may get stuck or injured on staples, glue or duct tape. You can mold clay around aluminum foil to save clay. This works for both air-dry and oven-bake clay. Helpful 0 Not Helpful 2. Keep the house small.

If it is too big, no fairy or gnome would want to live there, because it will be too obvious. A fairy house that sticks out will also attract trolls, or other predators, which hurt fairies and gnomes. Also, people who don't like fairies, called "stompers", will stomp on a fairy house that is too big and obtrusive in the woods. You could add a little pool for their feet But don't make it too big or their wings will get wet.

You can also add some glow in the dark stones in the house to give it a mystic look. Helpful 1 Not Helpful 1. Make sure you build your house in a quiet place, perhaps a corner, under a bush, but hidden.

You don't want to scare your fairies or gnomes by too much noise. Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0. Don't watch the fairy house all the time. They are fast, gentle creatures. They will most likely be shy so let them be. Helpful 1 Not Helpful 0.

Put the house in a flower filled area. Put a seashell full of rainwater of water next to it. Make sure you put your fairy house in a quiet place, where no one, like toddlers or children, can reach it. If you want to make it in your bedroom put it by a window where sunlight reaches it and fairy's can get to it. Build it in a place that Things To Make Out Of Wood Sticks Design will protect it. This includes under trees and bushes, so when it rains or snows the house will be protected from the elements. Since fairies aren't real you shouldn't worry about it being perfect and it will look great.

Submit a Tip All tip submissions are carefully reviewed before being published. If you want to put the fairy house in the garden, be forewarned that it will fall back to nature unless you have used water resistant glues. Don't worry: if you keep it inside, you are still likely to attract the local fairies. If there are any in your area, they've probably already ventured inside!

Related wikiHows How to. How to. About This Article. Co-authored by:. A compost pile can be as easy as starting a heap of veggie scraps, dead leaves, and grass clippings in the far corner of your yard, but most people like to contain their compost in a neat-looking compost bin. There are many different kinds of compost bins to fit every living situation: simple pallet bins, tumblers that make turning the compost easy, towers for urban yards and small spaces, and even worm composters that will make fast, odorless work of all your table scraps in the space under your kitchen sink.

Select the bin style that works for you, and if it is an outdoor model, install it near the garden, away from your house. After everything has decomposed and transformed into dark, rich-smelling, crumbly humus see picture above , you can sprinkle it around your trees, lawn, garden or houseplants to help them grow. Avid gardeners never seem to have enough compost.

If you leave an apple on a table, it will eventually decay and break down into a little pile of dirt. But if you want to get your compost pile to break down quickly and evenly so you can use it regularly in your garden, here are a few things to keep in mind:. An efficient compost pile is a careful balance of dry or brown things that contain carbon like leaves, straw, or paper and wet or green things that contain nitrogen like food scraps or rabbit droppings. I like to keep a small stockpile of horse manure green and straw brown on hand nearby as fodder to keep my pile in balance so it decomposes quickly.

The smaller you can shred or chop your compostable items before you put them into the pile, the faster and more evenly they will decompose.

Put slow-composting things like tree branches, nut shells, hair, latex, and old rope into a separate pile at the back of your lot, while keeping your faster compost pile closer to the garden. Turn your compost pile weekly to mix and aerate it, which will help everything to decompose much faster. You can do this with a pitchfork, but a compost tumbler bin can make this incredibly easy. Make sure your compost pile stays moist, like a damp sponge. The balanced combination of air and moisture in the pile ensures that the microorganisms breaking down your compost have everything they need to thrive and reproduce themselves.

While you technically can compost any food, animal-based or plant-based item, some things are better left out of the average home compost pile. For example, if you add fish, meat or a lot of fat to your compost pile, as they decompose, they will create a strong smell that will annoy your neighbors and bring every critter for miles to your yard!

When in doubt, leave it out. Also consider how much space you have to compost. For example, if you live in an apartment, you will be limited to vermicomposting just your kitchen scraps. Does your city have a municipal composting program or a community garden that composts?

Do you have a friend who gardens, who might like to have your coffee grounds or birdcage papers? Everything we can do to keep compostable materials out of the landfill will help prevent pollution and restore our depleted soils.

The following list is meant to get you thinking about your compost possibilities. Imagine how much trash we could prevent from going into the landfills if each of us just decided to compost a few more things! Just imagine if all of us kept so many things out of the landfills and returned their nutrients to the earth? For a truly sustainable future that our great-grandchildren can thrive in, closing the nutrient cycle by composting is essential, or we will deplete our precious soils into dust.

Good thing it is such an easy and frugal thing to do! After a year career in green building and environmental sustainability, chronic illness forced her to shift her expertise and passion from the public sphere to home and hearth.

Get the whole story behind SFF here. I just started my compost and put the scraps from a pineapple in there. Was that wrong? Should I not have added those? Any fruit or vegetable waste is compostable, but thicker, chunkier things will take longer to decompose. Excellent list…. I have been thinking of composting for a long time.

And your list gave me some great ideas and confidence. Thanks a lot for sharing such a valuable content. Thank you for the great information. Can I compost fruit? Not just rinds but strawberries that are mushy or old bananas, rotten tomatoes, etc? I appreciate hearing your perspective. Thank you so much for providing such an extensive list of what can be put into a composter and also for your clear explanation of brown vs green items. Absolutely, all of it can go into the composter.

Make sure the bedding is well-shredded before you put it in. The bedding is a Brown B , so make sure you have enough Green to balance the pile. Good luck! I had no idea. Thanks for this article! Question: You mentioned that kitchen scraps should be chopped finely so they break down faster. Would it make sense to just throw them in the blender for a few seconds before putting them in the compost? Or is that too much? If you want to go to that much trouble, it will only decompose that much faster.

Quickly tearing things like big kale leaves into somewhat smaller pieces is enough. Sorry to dwell on popcorn bags but these things are also great for containing congealed fats and oils while putting out to the green bin- and also permit freezing of meats, bones and other potentially-smelly spoiled food items, right up until garbage day.

An empty tin can will greatly facilitate this, as it too will be recycled and thus need not be diligently washed. More info on what not to compost here. Regarding composting dust: how do you know that the dust only contains organic materials?

If you are not comfortable with the uncertain microplastic content in your household dust, by all means keep it out of your compost pile. Household dust is mostly made up of dead skin cells, hair, and dander, which are very biodegradable. Every household will be different. Good day my good sir,.

All plants are compostable, the question is how long will it take. Thick stems should be chopped fine or put on brush piles for most effective composting. We have citrus trees in our yard. Yes you can, but take care to make sure your compost gets hot enough to kill any disease that might be on the leaves. Given citrus leaves are a bit waxy, they will take longer to break down, so be sure your pile is well balanced and large enough to get good and hot. The combined heat and radiation will kill the germ, preventing it from growing.

I have a 6lb. Can I open the bags and dump the tea in the compost pile, or does the tea have to be cooked first? Dear Dawn Gifford, This is an exceptional article. May I use snippets of FAQS and break down your list into achievable items to display and educate my childcare community. Kind Regards, Jessica. I understand all about from the earth back to the earth etc. All the years growing up on the small farm with my family we never and I mean never put anything cooked into the compost.

My parents the farmers said it was because it would draw rats. Also no meat, or dairy. What has changed?

Nothing has changed. Anything food is compostable. However, as you said, meat and dairy will likely draw rodents, which is why they are not generally recommended or included on this list. Do you know? I have barn swallow nesting around my house can I use their poop mixed with dirt as a starter for my composter?

May I have permission to use this article as part of a project I am pursuing? I am attempting to get my High school to pursue composting and recycling. Naturally, it will all be cited properly in MLA format. You may quote from the article with proper citation, but you may not reprint or republish the article in its entirety. Really nice article, composting is the way to go not only for those who have gardens but for those who live in apartments and confined places, Bokashi composting can help.

Cheers, Elna. Hi, my name is Vickie and I would like to use some facts from your post in a neighbor newsletter for 10 houses on my block. I am wondering if I can compost their leftovers? Will fermented feed spout in Things To Make Out Of Wood Sticks 50 the compost bin? I am hoping I can toss it in.

Your assistance would be appreciated. Thank you! You can certainly compost it. Some seeds might sprout, but just keep the compost turned and aerated and it will be no big deal. Thank you very much!!! That was the answer I was hoping for. LOVE this site… soooo informative! Hi, I am new to compost. I would like to start with foods that are scrap or turning bad. And what about foods that are cooked? The raw scraps I can handle but not sure about cooked. I understand breads and rice can be compost as well?

You can compost any food, but meat, dairy and oils will smell bad and draw animals. Make sure you balance any food you add with enough carbonaceous or brown items, like dead leaves or dried grass. The squirrel s keep hiding black walnuts for winter in my pile I throw them out when I see them.

Will it harm it if I miss some? That being said I did not read a complete list like you have given and the very first thing I dumped into the compost bin was a bag of grass clippings from under a walnut tree and about 10 mulched walnuts. Should I remove everything from the bin and start over? I would definitely remove the walnuts! My compost project on my NYCity Balcony-Garden consists of Eggshells, Coffee grounds, Tea leaves from bags, and Debris from flowering potted plants, as well as spent blossoms, leaves and small bits from aged cut flowers, A little Worm fell into it just the other day!

Is this recommended—? I would not add baking soda or epsom salts to your compost. They will shift the balance and possibly harm your worms. There is no need to add anything to compost except organic matter, and a little air and water.

Excellent post!! We are just starting to compost so this gave me some more great ideas. Thanks for sharing! And i leave this stuff in the pile forever. Hope this helps a little.

I flush the solid waste. It has to be the corn, or wheat litter. Not the clay. Yes, but because they are woody, they will take longer to break down. Pine needles actually make a great mulch for azaleas, blueberries, hydrangeas and other acid loving plants. Can you recycle the new Amazon tape? The black and brown one, reinforced with string. Can I compost used urinated on disposable baby diapers? I know the substance inside them sodium polyacrylate can be mixed into the garden to hold moisture which is great in Denver!

Disposable baby diapers are made of plastic and plastic fibers. But even with compostable diapers, you will quickly generate too many of them to be handled by home composting. The most sustainable option—by far—is cloth diapers.

Okay so here is my thinking after reading this article. I want to do two separate compost piles. If I compost this stuff and then spread it out in areas away from the garden just to keep it out of the landfills.

Will it hurt my yard to have this stuff around. My other idea was to bury the non usable biodegradable materials. That is a great idea!

You actually can use bones, etc. I was thinking and planning to do my 2nd compost pit as well! And I heard Red Wigglers are best use for the meat and meat by products as they try to decompose this stuff faster than burying in soil. Happy composting! I use a menstrual cup, and pour out and dilute the blood in my watering can when I am at home and can do that.

Hi — do you have any suggestions for composting over the winter months? I live in northern Arizona where the lows are well below freezing for months.

If you finish a compost pile that is big enough in the fall at least 3x3x3 cubic feet , it will likely heat up enough to steam during the winter, and be ready for spring. Then, you can start a new pile next to it anytime, even if it freezes over winter before it is complete. I always love to recycle my waste organic because I know that is very useful to grow flowers and veggies. I remember that I bought my first digester in and at the beginning I thought that I can throw there everything, and I mean everything, even newspapers, but after a while I realized that throwing there all the waste produced by my four dogs, all the organic waste from the household, some grass and leaves, is more than enough to produce compost.

Save the compost with pet waste in it Things To Make Out Of Wood Simple Name for your flowers, shrubs and trees. I thought dog and cat urine and poop killed flower plants,as well as house plants. I had flower plants on my back porch over the summer and the cat decided to use them as a liter box, unfortunately they all died.

No, you cannot compost cat or dog waste for food crops unless you use a special composter. However chicken, horse, bird and hamster manure are fine. More info on what to keep out of your pile here. Hi Dawn. I am an avid composter and I have a question about composting. I am applying Comfrey poultices to my horse for a muscle sprain.

I know that the comfrey is fabulous for the pile, but are the sterile gauze pads that I apply the herbs with compostable? Look forward to your response. It depends on what they are made from. Thanks you for this list. Are you able to compost charcoal briquettes and natural wood briquettes from the grill? I would leave that out as lighter fluid and other additives can contaminate your pile.

Also, too much ash of any kind will throw the nutrient balance of the pile out of whack. If you use any ash in the pile, it should be added very sparingly, only come from untreated firewood, and be mixed well into the pile.

I have a small water garden fish tank which is supposed to self clean, however, from time to time I empty it out replacing the old water with clean water.

My question being can I pour the old fish tank water onto my compost pile for moisture? Or is this a bad idea? Optimal moisture for a compost pile is like a wrung out sponge. However, the fish water itself would be very nutritious for growing plants.

Maybe use it to irrigate fruit trees? Wow, your list was exactly what I was looking for! I recently took over as the third generation of living in the family home, which includes a rather substantial garden. I purchased bags of compost to try to add some nutrients. It was rotor tilled twice, but prior to adding the compost.

Water immediately pools up on the surface, turns to mud, then dries out completely. Thanks so much! Great, I like the effort put here for listing all of them. The best thing you can do is get a professional soil test from your local Cooperative Extension and find out exactly what is going on.

What an awesome post! I am currently starting a city wide compost project… I collect food scraps and compost them down for local community gardens. The gardens then use the organic compost to grow and donate overstock produce to local charities for Sunday Dinners. Our project is new and our website is being constructed. I would love to use this list in one of my articles. I am trying to do an MLA 8 format cite format to cite your website but I cant see a publish date for the article.

Can you email me and let me know if you mind if i site it and give me a publish date if possible? Feel free to email me back.

I know a lot of that is compostable. I have a separate compost pile that I use for a lot of it. What chemicals are used in making cardboard and paper? Are the old sheets and towels made from GMO cotton? Is your alfalfa hay genetically modified? I am very cautious as to what I compost for use in my edible garden. So some people may want to consider what they will be using the compost for, and perhaps have two piles like I do. A hot composting process has been proven to break down many toxins, including pesticides and possibly GMOs , too.

Please just stop landfilling things that could be composted. I have the same question. I have an edible garden. And, on my property we use chemicals for tree health nutrients whose contents I get. Can I put those grass clippings on the compost pile?

Use your discretion and common sense. If you are using pesticides on your lawn, I would avoid using those clippings in the compost pile used for the vegetable garden and instead compost those clippings in a pile meant for non-edible usage. Composting is NOT just about free fertilizer for your garden; it is also about landfill methane reduction and ecological nutrient cycling, which we all desperately need.

Poops from dogs, cats and other carnivorous pets should never go into your compost pile, as it can spread disease. You can compost dog poop separately in a composter made for dog poop, but the resulting compost should never be used on food crops. Snakes, because they are reptiles, not mammals, have waste more like birds, and do not typically have parasites, worms and other toxic bacteria in their feces that cats and dogs can. I have found that they all break down quite well given enough time, as long as the sweepings and vacuum dust contains only organic materials.

However if you are concerned, leave it out. Can I compost the paper bags that my flour comes in? Great list! I work for a grocer here in California and we are beginning a composting program.

I have read through your list and there are a couple of questions that I have: 1 We are instructed to compost the whole egg cracked 2 We are instructed to compost waxed boxes 3 We are leaving the stickers on our produce 4 We are including citrus Are any of these things a reason for concern or because this is such a large endeavor this is acceptable. Composting on such a scale is a bit more complicated than throwing everything in a pile. If you have a knowledgeable compost expert or Master Composter on staff who knows how to compost on an industrial scale in a way that avoids both putrefaction and fire yes, fire , then you can safely compost anything that is actually biodegradable.

However, the stickers on produce are almost always made from plastic and are NOT biodegradable. They are one of the worst things you can put into a compost pile, and, in fact, are the bane of municipal compost operations nationwide.

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