Composting for the Absolute Beginner: How to Improve Your Soil for Better Organic Gardening

by Dede Cummings

In this comprehensive guide, you’ll learn everything you need to know about the various methods of composting and how to adapt them to your home and garden. With full-color photographs and easy-to-follow instructions, this will be an essential addition to every gardener’s library.

Great compost is one of the most important secrets of successful organic gardening. Topics covered here

With growing concerns about the use of pesticides, herbicides, and GMOs in mainstream gardening practices, more and more families are turning to their backyards to grow their own food using methods they know are safe. The need for clear, straightforward instruction on organic gardening techniques has never been greater. With Composting for Absolute Beginners , readers will get the information they need to prepare their gardens for healthy, abundant crops.

Genres: Nonfiction, Gardening

192 pages, Paperback

Published October 5, 2021

About the author

Dede Cummings is a writer, award-winning book designer, publisher, and former commentator for Vermont Public Radio. At Middlebury College, she was the recipient of the Mary Dunning Thwing Award and attended the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference as an undergraduate fellow. In 1991, she received a fellowship to study with Hayden Carruth at the Bennington Writers’ Workshop. In 2013, she returned as a poetry contributor to the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference. Her poetry has been published in Mademoiselle, Connotation Press, MomEgg Review, Green Mountains Review, among others, and anthologized in Roads Taken: Contemporary Vermont Poetry and Healing the Divide: Poems of Kindness and Connection. She was a Discover/The Nation poetry semi-finalist. In 2016, she was awarded a writer’s grant from the Vermont Studio Center. Her first poetry collection entitled To Look Out From was the winner of the 2016 Homebound Publications Poetry Prize and was published in 2017. Her second poetry collection, The Meeting Place, was published in 2020 by Salmon Poetry. Dede lives in Vermont, where she designs books and is the founder and publisher of www.greenwriterspress.com, a global press devoted to environmental activism, social justice, and sustainable publishing.

Dede lives in Brattleboro, Vermont, in a house built by her husband, Steve Carmichael. They have three children, Sam, Emma, and Joey. After Dede's most recent hospital stay and surgery for Crohn's disease in 2006, she began hiking the Long Trail (the length of Vermont) in one week sections, beginning to realize a long-term goal that had been put off due to illness.

Living With Crohn's & Colitis was her first published book. Her second book, "Cooking Well: IBS" came out October 25, 2011, and it is a description of IBS (Irritable Bowel Syndrome), and a helpful guide with lifestyle tips and over 100 recipes. The author was first diagnosed with IBS in her 20s, and it is her hope that by reading these books, people will become educated and informed about how lifestyle and diet are key to maintaining health in today's world. Book Number Three in this series is The Living With Crohn's & Colitis Cookbook.

Dede has published organic and holistic lifestyle series for Skyhorse, including The Medicinal Gardening Handbook, The Organic Gardening Handbook, and The Good Living Guide to Beekeeping.

Reviews

[Kelly · Rating 2 out of 5]

This should have been a pamphlet or a series of infographics.

Very repetitive and lots of out-of-scope commentary. The info that was ostensibly useful wasn’t well organized and sometimes contradictory. I feel like she wrote down everything she had to say about composting, realized she only had 20 pages of info, then tried desperately to bloat it into a “proper” book size.

[Betsy Whitehead · Rating 2 out of 5]

Super disappointed in this book. The author starts the book with a story of loading up a black, plastic composting drum with materials and when she came back to it, she had rich, black, crumbly compost. She goes on to tell the reader that she lives on a lot of land in Vermont. I should have stopped reading right there. Already I knew this author had nothing for me.

This book seemed to be focused on how to make the best compost. To be fair, the subtitle is, “How to Improve Your Soil for Better Organic Gardening.” That should have clued me in that this book was less about the beginning composter and more about gardening. Additionally, I live in a city in southern Texas, so all the talk about frozen compost piles was lost on me and there was zero talk of composting in hot, humid climates. The few mentions about urban composting were anecdotal and not instructive.

I started composting for one reason - to keep food scraps out of the landfill. I’m not a gardener but figured I’d spread the compost around the yard or fill in low areas of the yard. My objective was not the compost, but the environmental impact of reducing the waste my family produces, especially since I make dinner at home every night.

Ultimately, the title was misleading even if the subtitle was more descriptive. “Beginning Composting for the Experienced Gardner” would have been a more accurate name. I guess I know a little better what I’m looking for now.

[Stephanie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a great book, but because it is for absolute beginners, it is probably easier to find 90% of the information in here through a quick Internet search.

[Linda S · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am attempting to do a better job at composting this year, since in the past I've just thrown mostly greens into my outdoor compost bin. It does eventually break down, but I was looking to speed up the process but needed additional knowledge to do so. This book was for a total beginner and even though I was composting I wasn't doing it very efficiently. Using what I learned in this book, my goal is to upgrade my composting to using a more logical approach, adding more brown materials and smaller pieces to get compost faster.

[Lori · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the most comprehensive book on composting I have read so far. I highly recommend Cummings' book! There is a lot of information that is useful for both novice and seasoned gardeners. In addition to photographs and text, the book contains an appendix, glossary, and index. If you feel brave enough, there is a plan on how to build a 3-bin compost system! This is a 5-star book!

[Casper Weiss Bang · Rating 2 out of 5]

Most of the book seemed more like fillers than actually content. Maybe it is more of a timepiece, with a unique dated writing style, maybe it's just not my book type. The last 30 pages seemed valuable, and what I had expected the entire book to be. But the first half was basically useless. Would not recommend.

[Jenna · Rating 2 out of 5]

Skimmed. It felt rather disorganized and hopped from subject to subject without really going super in depth in what I was hoping for, mainly how to compost in an apartment/balcony. Oh well, this would've been nice if I did have a large garden!

[Don Harton · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very good introduction to composting. Cummings’ enthusiasm is catchy and her encouragement is helpful. Alas, I am not sure how well my suburban Dallas pile will match her rural Vermont experience. We shall see!

[Megan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book has some great ideas and covered interesting programs and regimens used around the country. Reading it confirmed that I’m a trench composting kind of gardener. I don’t have the energy for above-ground composting.

[OneDayI'll · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good starting point using different methods. It shows natural methods, bins, and more. And how to use it, ratios, and what can be composted.