A Word From Our Mentor, Mrs. Coons

Dear Shenvironment,
I’ve been quiet for a while now but not giving much thought about the compost/garden endeavor. I’ve contacted many people and I would like to summarize here what new information I’ve learned.
First, I’ve e-mailed and talked to Mark Waford. He is the guru of local school gardens.
I am including several web links to read about some of the projects he has done. He started a garden in Guilderland, and then went to East Greenbush and now he is Bethlehem Middle school. Along the way he has left a legacy of establishing gardens.
Some notes I took while having conversations with him:

• He plants directly from seed
• Plant cold climate crops at end of March. This includes leaf lettuce, red lettuce and green lettuce. These should be able to serve in June before students leave for summer. Plant these again second week of July and they will be ready in September.
• Raised bed gardens are the best
• First week of October is “Farm Fest” A great opportunity to serve our school grown food and celebrate it. http://www.agmkt.state.ny.us/f2s/news.html
• Check out these web links to see some of the amazing ideas he has put into practice:

He advocates for using washable trays in the cafeteria
http://www.refresheverything.com/dishwashergreenteam

Some information about his current garden
http://bcsd.k12.ny.us/News/20092010/092309_BCMSgardenclub.html
Article in the Spotlight news:
http://spotlightnews.com/spotlightnews/article.php?article_id=tK1254860789t4acba7f5eb3fd
Scroll down on this site to see some nice pictures of the Goff Middle School garden.
http://hudsonsaratogachefs.blogspot.com/2009/11/school-garden-at-howard-l-goff-middle.html
Times union article
http://www.timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=807969&category=REGION

Farm to School:
http://www.farmtoschool.org/state-home.php?id=17

I also talked to Frank Pemberton, Master Gardener from Cornell Cooperative Extension. He sent me some great literature and we are trying to set up a visit from him so he can help us set up the greenhouse. He will also help us test our soils

http://www.ccesaratoga.org/

I talked with Mark Darling who is facilities manager from Ithaca College. He had a lot of knowledge on composting. He sent some very valuable information which I will include at the end of this summary as a resource. We were told that Ithaca had 9 Earth Tubs. Mark said they did not have any but instead opted to have a commercial company collect the compost and haul it away to be composted. He says this is the future with organic garbage to have a central location compost for a large area instead of individual composters. Still as a learning tool it is good to have one on our campus and commercial composting is not yet offered in our area.

Cornell Waste Management Institute:

http://cwmi.css.cornell.edu/composting.htm

Some in-vessel compost systems vendors:

http://www.calrecycle.ca.gov/Organics/Food/Compost/InVessel2.htm#HotRot

Locations of Commercial Composters:

http://www.findacomposter.com/home

What Cooperative Extension is doing in Ithaca and resources:

http://ccetompkins.org/compost/

I also met with Jay Tourtellot, Director of Operations and Ken Patenaude, Director of Facilities to cite the Earth Tubs and the locations of the gardens. The Earth Tubs need access to electricity. When Jay and Ken surveyed High School East, they felt that the best place to locate the Earth Tubs was on the south side of the building next to the fenced in generator (?) There are two large yews planted at this spot and interestingly they are round and about the same size as the Earth Tubs so you can just about envision them there.
The gardens would be best placed in the courtyards. This is due to the easy access of water to this site. Den said it would be easy to install a facet here since it backs up to science labs and bathrooms. We were hoping to collect rain water off the roofs of the school but they are designed to drain internally which means we won’t be able to collect the water. Ken and Jay were glad that the gardens would replace the grass because it is difficult to cut the grass in the courtyard. Any grass that remains after garden installation could be done with a hand rotary mower.

Now for some ideas about how to get the gardening and composting off the ground. Possibly we could form mini teams like our High School dodge ball teams are set up. Each group would consist of one teacher, one parent, two high school students, one middle school student and one elementary school student. They would be given a garden plot, seeds, hand shovel, tee shirts, gloves and gardening manual and would see which plot was the most successful. We could have categories such as most creative, most artistic, biggest carrot, etc. Having a faculty member on each team would help with supervision and by including all the different levels of students would make it a community event.
As for the composting, we can start in the cafeteria kitchens with produce that is discarded. Through the gardening effort we can build a core group to actually start the collection of compost in the cafeteria starting in September. This year we need to install and get the operation running..

The library has been helpful at High School East as well. They purchased a couple new garden books and are looking to fortify our magazine and book collection on the topic. From one of these new books I compiled a list of start up equipment for the garden and then priced it out at Home Depot:
Gloves $4.00 each
Garden Rack $12.00
Watering can $ 6.00
Spade $14.00
Shovel $10.00
Wheel Barrel $124.00
Lg Wagon $99.00

Trex Board for raised beds $24.00/12 ft
Large hand tumbler composter for the elementary schools $99 each

Composting Food-scraps…Getting Started

Composting is the biological decomposition of organic material to produce a soil like substance called humus. The degree of control and management required to turn organic materials into humus depends on the availability of raw material, technology applied, space available, end-product uses, and cost considerations. These are also the factors that determine what type of composting can be applied to a specific campus’ needs.
The following formula was developed as a result of the experiences at Ithaca College and may be useful for planning purposes:

Number of Student meals per day X .36 = Food-scrap produced per day

___________ x .36 =____________lbs.

1,500 lbs. of food scraps = 1 cubic yard

___________cubic yards per day

1 cubic yard of food-scrap requires 20 square feet of space to compost
(food-scrap needs bulking at a 3:1 ratio)

cubic yards per day x 20 square feet =area needed to compost each day

____________ x 20 =_______square feet

We figure there are about 250 days of potential composting at this volume per academic year.
Square feet per day x 250 = total area needed.

___________ x 250 = ___________square feet

That is how much space will be needed just to mix food-scraps with a bulking agent and pile it in a windrow measuring five feet high and ten feet wide.

Space requirements:

The number of square feet needed to pile food-scraps and bulking agent is determined by the method used. Each method will require a different length of active composting time, or cycle, to reduce food scraps. Space will also be needed to manage the finished, about one-tenth the space of the original pile.

Static pile 9 months 1-1/3 cycles per year
Passive aerated pile 6 months 2 cycles per year
Turned windrow 3 months 4 cycles per year
Static aerated pile 6 weeks 5 cycles per year
In-vessel System 2 weeks 15 cycles per year
Once it has been determined how much food scrap is generated and there is a sense of the space required it becomes necessary to seek approval for the idea of composting. The following are points to consider during the planning and approval process at a typical college or university.

• Identify the “key players”, people whose support will be needed to achieve success.

• Identify the “stake holders”, these are the people who will be responsible for collecting and processing the food, as well as the people who will use the end product.

• Involve the key players and the stakeholders in preparing the proposal that will need to be presented to the decision-makers at the institution.

• Build a coalition from the campus community of students, faculty, staff and administrators and be sure to include underclass people to provide continuity as the process may take several years.

• Identify how decisions of this type are made and prepare a proposal that will provide the information the decision-makers need, in a format that they can understand and accept.

• Be able to state why composting should become a part of the solid waste management strategy for the campus.

• Determine the goal of the compost program. It could be a pilot project, research project, campus community education program, a way to reduce disposal costs, pollution prevention, or green image enhancement to name a few.

• Consider alternatives to a compost program that processes 100% of organics on campus such as; contracting for off-site composting, processing only yard waste, processing only pre-consumer food scraps, or develop it as a demonstration project.

• Consider partnering with other campuses nearby, other similar institutions (corrections facilities and residential care facility) or the municipality.

• Design the compost program for sustainability. Make sure that the institution embraces the program beyond the tenure of the individual spear heading the effort.

• Be prepared to correct misconceptions about compost with facts and case studies. Success depends on good research.

• Compromise but, persevere in the effort to educate about compost as a part of environmentally responsible solid waste, management.

Mark Darling http://www.ithaca.edu/remp
mdarling@ithaca.edu 607-274-1777