Composting is easy and fun, great for your garden and the environment too!

Step 1 - Find the right site for your compost bin

Place your compost bin in a reasonably sunny site on bare soil. If you have to put your compost bin on concrete, or patio slabs make sure there’s a layer of paper and twigs or existing compost on the bottom. Choose a place where you can easily add ingredients to the bin and get the compost out.

Step 2 - Add the right ingredients

Have a container in your kitchen like an old ice cream tub. Fill your container with everything from fruit and vegetable peelings, tea bags, toilet roll tubes, cereal boxes and eggshells. Do not to compost cooked food, meat or fish.

Step 3 - Fill it up

Empty your kitchen container along with your garden waste and lawn clippings into your compost bin. A 50/50 mix of greens and browns is the perfect recipe for good compost. Don't put too much lawn clippings in.

Step 4 - Wait a while

It can take between nine and twelve months for your compost to be ready for use, so wait and let nature do the work is all you need to do. Keep adding greens and browns to top up your compost.

Step 5 - Ready for use

You know your compost is ready to use when it has turned into a crumbly, dark material, resembling thick, moist soil and gives off an fresh earthy aroma.

Step 6 - Removing your compost

Lift the front of your bin or open the hatch at the bottom and scoop out the fresh compost with a garden spade or fork.

Step 7 - Use it

If your compost looks a little lumpy with twigs and bits of eggshell don't worry – this is perfectly normal. Use your compost to enrich borders and vegetable patches, plant up patio containers, dig into your vegetable patch or feed the lawn.