Evening star., 1947-10-31
This and That
Rr Charles z, TraceweU

Human beings are not very sensible some
times, are they?
They pay fancy prices for fertilizers and
erich earth every spring, and often cannot
get it at any price when all the time they have
in their own yards what some consider the
best material in the world.
Just leaves!
Thousands of tons of leaves wasted every
year. to go up in smoke. or be hauled away at
considerable expense, when they make the best
of all materials to be composted
Any corner of yard may be used for this
purpose, and leaves and other waste yard
materials piled in, with various chemicals, and
with water they all go to make some OF the
best of all fertilzing materials.
Tree leaves may be piled in such places by
the truckload, being so fine in composition
that they tramp down, through the use OF
water until an unbelievable number is used.
Big books have been written about the
making and use of compost.
Still, most home gardeners pay little if any
attention to them.
Perhaps we are wasteful nation, as has
been charged.
The use of such materials amounts to bother,
and an unwritten creed of many Americans is
mot to be bothered"
1t is too much trouble, but probably 1t is
more than that
AS a nation of people, we have got ourselves
lnJO position Oh IOI WdIlIus W uo dIlyIilIlis
about which we know nothing
We know nothing, of course, about compost
and its uses
The large books may have been written, but
they have been read by comparatively few
We want to buy our materials. 1t is easier
than to make them And, by buying, we show
no ignorance, we think
But we rake up and burn or throw away,
the very things that would make good fertilizer
for the garden.
The leaves may all be gone for this year
but there will be other years, unless the
Russians get us first, and we should begin
thinking now about what may be done later
in this respect
Once the idea gets into the individual mind
that something interesting lies in leaves just
plain leaves, and that the handling of them to
make compost is good business as well as an
interesting one the average person is going to
do something about this matter. Maybe.
This means that in the future we may have
to endure less odor of burning leaves. Now it
must be admitted that to some persons this
smell is sort of perfume of the outdoors
but to still others it is just plain stink.
A little wood smoke, on a frosty autumn
day. has its place, but beyond this little it
becomes distasteful, reminding the imaginative
of the destruction which it is.
Construction is the American WORD, not de-
struction And one good way to carry it into
effect is to make compost.
This is simply the taking of waste vegetable
materials from the garden and street, especially
in the form of leaves from the trees, and so
treating them that, they become the best fer
tilizer.
Use of this organic material must appeal to
the common sense of good many peole, be-
cause more and more are taking to it.
There Is whole creed of modern agriculture
growing up around It, Perhaps 1t is not ap-
plicable on wide scale, but the small scale of
things of the average household is just suited
to it.
These leaves from the trees are God given
materials We should do something with them
besides burning them or having them hauled
away.