Best Compost for Vegetable Garden
Best Compost for Vegetable Garden
Best compost for vegetable garden health and happiness is homemade! It’s free, easy and you control what goes into your compost. But it can take months before homemade compost is ready to mix into your soil. And depending on which types of vegetables you are growing, you’ll want to adjust the ingredients you use to make your compost.
So while homemade compost is generally best compost for vegetable garden health, you may still need store-bought compost to start and possibly for adding additional needed nutrients.
different vegetables have different nutrient needs!
Regardless of the type of foods you’re growing in your vegetable garden, all vegetables benefit from the organic microbes and elements that come from compost, including:
- nitrogen
- phosphorus
- potassium
- calcium
- carbon
- magnesium
But some vegetables require extra helpings of some of these elements!
There are ingredients that can be put into compost that give extra boosts of certain elements. The most important nutrients to know for vegetable gardening: nitrogen, phosphorus, potatssium.
Larger tomato varieties need higher amounts of this N-P-P than many other garden vegetables in order to stay healthy and produce well.
Example: if you’re growing tomatoes and you have a koi pond in your backyard, remove some of that muck from the bottom and add it to your compost pile. What does that do? The muck (pond sludge) is a combination of fish poop and decaying plant matter which has lots of nitrogen and phosphorus. Added to your compost, it breaks down quickly and adds a rich, organic nutrient-packed punch to the pile!
In addition to the larger tomato varieties, other vegetables that benefit from higher nitrogen include asparagus, brussels sprouts, cabbage, onions and larger-sized peppers.
What are the most common, beneficial compost ingredients?
- farm animal manure (cow, chicken are the most common)
- plant matter (grass cuttings, fallen leaves, vegetables/fruits)
- kitchen scraps (coffee grinds, rotting vegetables and fruits, peelings)
- fish pond muck (bottom sludge contains fish poop, decaying plant matter, algae)
Whether homemade or bought from a store, good healthy compost added to soil will:
- improve aeration for healthier, stronger root growth
- increase water retention and improve soil consistency
- buffer and ensure a more balanced pH level
Homemade Compost
Homemade compost is most commonly made from plant material and kitchen scraps. Over time it breaks down creating organic matter full of nutrients your vegetables need. Creating your own compost, whether in small amounts or a big pile in the backyard, can work wonders in keeping your vegetables healthy and happy.
While homemade compost can be free and easy to create, it does require some space and time. Compost is best created outdoors, but small batches can also be made on your kitchen countertop.
Ultimately, making homemade compost is smart! It makes you more eco-friendly (recycling kitchen scraps and yard debris), more self-sustaining (instead of relying solely on store-bought fertilizers) and compost doesn’t have the same risk of potentially overdosing and burning plant roots that can happen with commercial fertilizers!
Rotting Veggies, Carrot Tops and Peelings, Coffee Grinds...
Smaller kitchen compost bins are a great way to recycle and create smaller amounts of compost for container gardens and potted vegetable plants.
Kitchen scraps like rotting vegetables, carrot tops, carrot and potato peelings, coffee grinds are great for making compost. Snip off dead leaves from your plants and add them in!
Kitchen countertop compost bins are made specifically to resist smells and fruit fly intrusion. Many come with a carbon filter, a tight seal and great instructions on making a healthy organic compost in a small space, for a small vegetable garden.
For larger vegetable gardens like a raised bed or in-ground garden, a larger outdoor compost bin or pile will be needed in order to produce enough compost to keep the soil healthy. Smaller space outdoor gardens or several container gardens on a patio can benefit greatly from a compost bin instead of creating a large compost pile. There are lots of sizes and shapes, some that can easily rotate and others that hold lots of compost for bigger needs.
Homemade compost: grass cuttings, fallen leaves, kitchen scraps (vegetable/plant/fruit matter not fats, dairy or anything processed), used coffee grinds and optional farm animal manure (chicken, cow, fish).
Commercial Compost
There are different types of compost available to buy both at local stores and online. Big bags of compost can be heavy, and range in price. For vegetable gardens, look for farm animal manure compost, plant-based compost, or a blend of both.
If you are growing tomatoes, peppers and leafy greens, look for a compost that is high in nitrogen. Farm-animal manure-based composts (cow, chicken) are typically highest in nitrogen, and most cost-effective.
Many new food gardeners, and anyone that hasn’t been around farms much, is skeptical about using cow manure. Doesn’t it smell? Isn’t that kind of… gross?!! Probably the most well-known and widely used cow manure compost makers/products is Black Kow. Here’s the Black Kow website so you can read their promise that there’s no odor, it’s all natural, and it contains up to 10x MORE NUTRIENTS than regular garden soils!
There are also lots of liquid and powder forms of compost you can buy in smaller amounts. You can buy everything from straight cow or chicken manure, to blends of manure and plant material, to “gourmet” compost without manure and containing oyster shells and added limestone and other nutrient rich elements.
When buying commercial compost, make sure it’s from a legitimate source that tests for disease, fungus and other elements that you don’t want to introduce into your gardens. It’s important that any manure-based compost come from farm animals that have a diet based on grass and greens.
Which type of Compost is Best for YOUR Vegetable Garden?
The most common foods grown in vegetable gardens are tomatoes, peppers, carrots, leafy greens. and herbs. This is mainly because there are varieties of these foods that can grow in most all plant hardiness zones. And many can also be grown in small space food gardens like containers, hanging baskets, buckets and raised beds. Also, these vegetable plants produce higher yields than many others, making them a smart choice.
Are you growing these vegetables? Did you know that these veggies all have varying nutrient needs? The main nutrients your vegetable garden will need will include nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium, as well as calcium and magnesium.
Farm-animal manure-based compost is higher in nitrogen
A farm-animal manure-based compost is a great choice when growing larger sized tomatoes, peppers plus leafy greens and because it contains increased levels of nitrogen plus phosphorus that these plants need. Fish manure compost can also be a great choice, though it is usually priced higher than cow and/or chicken (dairy, farm animal) manure compost products. Horse manure can also be beneficial, but is not as common.
nitrogren-rich compost is what your Tomatoes, Peppers, Leafy Greens (and more) crave!
Does your Soil Need a Nitrogen amendment? Phosphorus? How's your soil's pH level (is it between 6-7?)
To ensure you’re starting with the best soil, and for regular maintenance, there are soil test kits that can come in handy. Test your soil and start it off right. Or use a test kit to help with problem solving if you’ve got some unhealthy plants.
But besides testing and problem solving, the best thing for food gardeners to do is simply create a daily 10 minute habit of inspecting! Every day, look closely at the leaves of your vegetable plants.
Watch for signs that they could be malnourished. Yellowing leaves, curling leaves (when they aren’t supposed to curl), plants generally not looking strong and healthy are all signs to watch for. Look out for fungus, potential diseases, rot, pests like caterpillars and white fly.
Once you see a potential problem, you can then work to identify the cause. Vegetable plants are very good at telling us when they need help, we just need to pay good attention to them! Healthy soil, which includes periodic compost amendments, helps your vegetable garden to fight against pest infestations, diseases and root rot. And it helps your food garden to produce more nutrient-rich, better quality and higher-quantity vegetables for you and your family to eat!
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