Composting in Paradise

Guest blogger Cher Mohring

I love my job so much it’s hard to even take a vacation without thinking about reducing waste. That’s why during a recent trip to the Bahamas I discovered I had as many pictures of compost as I did of the beach!  Because most of my Facebook friends are not that interested in seeing compost pictures, I decided this was a good place to share them.

Here in Southwest Ohio, we use compost to loosen our clay soil for better root penetration, improve its capacity to hold water, and add essential nutrients. 

Grand Bahama Island’s soil is very sandy.  Sandy soil has large air spaces between particles, allowing water to drain very quickly and microbes to consume organic matter quickly.  For this reason, amending their soil with compost is essential to hold water and add nutrients for plants to grow.  

Wish you lived in the Bahamas? Me too! Let’s live vicariously through these Bahama residents and see how they compost in their backyards.

Mary has a beautiful, eclectic landscape.  She has a constant supply of palm tree leaves to feed multiple compost sites.



This three bin unit is overflowing with material.

Piles of palm leaves.

 

Karl and Eva have amazing vegetable gardens that require lots of compost.  As you can see from their pictures below, they are also excellent at reusing!

 

 

One of three compost bins made from old skids.

 

Check out the size of this bin!

 

They like to sift their compost before using it in the garden.



Here are some of their container gardens where they use the compost.

 

Tom and Marilyn have piles of palm leaves like Mary, but they are just getting started with composting food scraps.  It will be interesting to see how long those coconuts take to decompose...

 

 

 

Ol’ Freetown Farm grows papaya, bananas, sugar cane, green beans, tomatoes, peppers, and various other vegetables and herbs.  They also keep chickens, horses, and goats. What a great combination to make and use compost!

 

Compost pile of horse manure and sugar cane.

Finished compost pile with volunteer potatoes growing in it.

One of their sources of compost material.

 

Just in case you’re not as much of a compost geek as me, here’s a picture of the beach.

 

This guest blog is written by Cher Mohring, Program Specialist at Hamilton County Recycling and Solid Waste District.  Cher assists schools, events, and multi-family residences to set up waste reduction programs.