Soil & fertility
Turning kitchen scraps, yard waste and woody junk into the stuff that grows the food.
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No. 01Works here
Soil & fertility
Insulated hot composter
A sealed, insulated bin with an air core down the middle. Hot compost from kitchen scraps and leaves in a few square feet, and it keeps going after an open heap has frozen.
About $230 for the bin
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No. 02Works here
Soil & fertility
Biochar, made and charged
Woody waste — prunings, cleared buckthorn — turned into char, then soaked in nitrogen until it feeds the soil instead of robbing it.
About $45 for a charging tote; the wood is waste you already have
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No. 04Partly worked here
Soil & fertility
Nettle patch & fermented feed
A contained bed of stinging nettle, cut every few weeks and fermented into a high-nitrogen liquid feed.
Little — a few plants and a root barrier
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No. 05Partly worked here
Soil & fertility
Banana peel tea
Peels steeped for a few days as a potassium drench at flowering. Cheap and quick — and weaker than its reputation.
Nothing: a jar and your peels