Tom did set up my Christmas present early. The composter shown is the photo below. It is called the Earthmaker and completely self contained. Right now it is sitting on our patio as we have not yet decided on a permanent location.
Before we left for Utah I started to compost.
I had been saving some kitchen scraps for awhile and decided to go ahead and start loading the top section. Got some grass cutting from my neighbor to cover the food.
Also added some shredded paper and leaves. Didn't add any water as we were going out of town and I just wanted to let it sit.
This is how it looks today. Yesterday I had added a lot of scraps , leaves and the remains of the plants that got zapped by the frost we had late last week. Also added moisture which should help everything to start to decompose faster.These two photos show how we tried to protect the trees and garden from the frosts on December 26th through the 28th. The trees came through fine but some of the plants were hit too hard to survive. Pulled out all the tomato plants and saved the larger tomatoes. Maybe I'll make some green tomato salsa. All the squash plants bit the dust. What I really wanted to protect was the strawberry patch. Looks good so far, as do all the root vegetables.
You know it was cold when the bird bath freezes over.
Happy New Year!
