COMPOSTING
About Composting
Composting is a natural process and the ultimate green machine. Each year, we naturally compost up to 100,000 tons of organic materials. This helps to save our planet from greenhouse gases generated in landfills.
Wallace Farm products are of the highest quality. We are proud that our compost holds the Seal of Testing Assurance from the U.S. Composting Council, assuring you of the highest quality products for you to use in your garden and landscaping.
Our compost ingredients consist of ground wood products, yard waste, cotton, animal manures, produce such as lettuces and vegetables, and food processing materials such as pasta, rice and flour. We do not compost any meat, fish, or bones.
Composting is a “controlled process” which converts recyclable materials into environmentally enhancing compost.
We start with a majority – 90% or more – of carbon-based materials such as sawdust, leaves, ground up wood, and even cardboard. Then we add smaller amounts of nitrogen in the form of some cotton, produce like lettuce and vegetables and manure. This is uniformly mixed together and placed in windrows. We carefully monitor the natural aerobic process to maintain the correct oxygen and moisture mix, turning the windrows weekly. High temperatures within the windrows at or above 131 F are maintained for two months.
We then stockpile our compost for a minimum of 8 to 12 months to insure that the compost products are mature and the very best for your garden and landscaping.
Benefits of Composting
- Improves the soil structure, porosity, and density, thus creating a better plant root environment.
- Increases infiltration and permeability of heavy soils, thus reducing erosion and runoff.
- Improves water holding capacity, thus reducing water loss and leaching in sandy soils.
- Supplies a variety of macro and micronutrients.
- May control or suppress certain soil-borne plant pathogens.
- Supplies significant quantities of organic matter.
- Improves cation exchange capacity (CEC) of soils and growing media, thus improving their ability to hold nutrients for plant use.
- Supplies beneficial microorganisms to soils and growing media.
- Improves and stabilizes soil pH.
- Can bind and degrade specific pollutants.