From the well-composted Univest Studios at Lehigh Valley Public Community in Bethlehem, PA, it is time for a very special episode of chemical-free horticultural hijinks You Bet Your Garden.

I'm your host, Mike McGrath.

Earth Day is upon us and May 1st to the 7th is International Compost Awareness Week.

And so on today's show, we'll drop the usual phone calls - the answers haven't been all that good lately anyway - and devote the entire show to all things compost, including California's new law that requires every household to compost.

So keep your eyes and/or ears right here, cats and kittens, because it's all coming up faster than you harvesting premium black gold, as well as your garlic and tomatoes.

Right after this.

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All right, it is the busiest, busiest month of May.

You can imagine not only is it time for the Morris dancers to come out, chase away the winter evils and bring spring to your beds with bells and colorful scarfs and who knows what else?

And it's also the center of an international composting celebration.

But now I want to welcome our very special guest.

Robert Reed is the media relations manager for Recology.com.

And I got so much to ask you about.

The first is about a week ago, there appeared stories in all of the newspapers.

Californians forced to compost.

And I thought, Oh, man.

That's where we're going to go for our rat meat later on.

But then as I delved into it, it was totally, totally wrong.

You're not telling people to compost.

You're telling them that their compostables must be separated out.

- The city was looking to reduce the amount of material it was sending to landfill.

And it asked Recology, the city's recycling company, if we could collect food scraps separately from people's houses and from businesses and turn them into compost, and we started doing that in 1996.

- Mm-hm.

- And now we're just 26 years later, and it's been very successful and many, many benefits to the soil and local farms, and now many cities across the country are following San Francisco's lead and now cities up and down the state of California are also implementing kerb-side food scrap collection programs for composting.

- What are we going to do about misinformation?

- Well, I think this is a very, very important question about information and providing facts and encouraging people to compost correctly to engage and participate in these programs, but, um, I think the success of these programs is dependent in a large way on having a good conversation with residents and with businesses so that people are aware of the very things that you're asking about and people understand what they're being asked to do and where the compost goes and why it benefits the soil and how, and, you know, that they ought to be better at the bin and sort correctly.

And start simply by composting their banana peels and coffee grounds and their eggshells.

All things that came from farms and ought to go back to, we will collect it.

We are collecting it kerb-side.

We have been doing this for 26 years, and we have put a lot of resources and effort into our composting process, and we operate eight composting facilities here on the West Coast.

But we're doing, we're having a lot of dialog and communication with our customers, so while they might not actually be making the compost, they are providing the feedstock so that we can collect it and make the compost, so in a way, they're making compost, they're part of a composting program.

They're an essential part and we can't do it without them, and we're in this together, and really some very good things are being accomplished in this way.

We're helping farms grow, improve their soil health, we're helping farms, we're keeping materials out of landfills or reducing landfill gas emissions.

And I could go on and on.

I don't want to give too long of answers, but we're doing a lot of good work together, and just in San Francisco alone we have kept more than two million tons of compostable material out of the landfill through this program.

- Now, do you think that has anything to do with the incredible number of high-class restaurants?

Are they leading the charge?

Because they often get charged by weight, all right?

- Yeah, we were fortunate to have somewhere on the order of 5,000 restaurants in San Francisco.

You can eat in a different restaurant here every day for the rest of your life, if you wish.

And so they, when we started doing this, they very much embraced this program quickly, and they're doing a great job for the most part on separating their food scraps, the kitchen trimmings from the preparation of meals, the plate scrapings, you know, the broccoli stems and the French fries that people leave on their plate, and those go into the green bin and then we collect that material, so the restaurants and businesses provide about 50% of the material that we're collecting in San Francisco for composting, the other 50% would come from homes and apartment buildings.

- When did this program begin?

- In 1996.

- And what's your compliancy?

- Well...

It's very high in terms of participation.

The city passed, in 2009, The city passed an ordinance, a local law making participation mandatory, so pretty much all properties in San Francisco participate in this program.

Prior to being mandatory, about half of them were participating a and now all of them are.

- So when we get to the Wind Rose site, how are things happening there, are you getting high quality compost?

- Yeah, we operate eight composting facilities, five in California.

We operate two of the largest composting facilities in California, and we've worked with agronomists, some of the best in the country, that have advised us on our composting process.

We've tried different techniques and we've put a lot of effort and energy into this, and, um, we are receiving a lot of material.

San Francisco, San Francisco alone is sending 500 tons of material to the composting facility every day.

And we're turning this into.. We've got an 11 step process, Mike.

And so we, you know, we really have put our shoulder into this and we're producing a very nutrient rich compost.

And the farmers want all of it that they can get, they're really...

It's helping them grow more healthy food and it's helping them save water.

- OK, so that's the endgame, is to distribute the finished compost to mostly agricultural facilities?

- Yeah, most of it goes on to vineyards and orchards.

And then some of it goes to landscape supply yards so that people who want, you know, have a yard and they want some as a soil amendment for their garden, they can get that.

- I'm sorry.

What do you call the finished product?

- Well, we have different, different blends.

- Mm-hm.

- So we're not, you know, we don't have a bunch of... You know, branded names that we would be promoting, you know, in a in a conventional way, but we do make a number of different types of compost and then one of the really neat things is we make custom blends for the farms, so we'll have amendments on our site like gypsum and lime and sandy loam and redwood sawdust and rice hulls.

And so...and minerals.

And so we have the ability to help, to make custom blends to help farms get really a soil amendment, a specific type of soil amendment or blend that they would need to get their soils back in balance.

- The reason we're having you on right now is the fact that International Composting Day Is May 1st, is that correct?

- It is, a couple of weeks after Earth Day, so it would be early in May.

Yes.

- And then there's International Composting Week.

Uh, which is the first to the seventh?

- Yeah, and we support this idea, and we try to... ..do communication around this, these... ..dates on the calendar, so we do our social media posts and we mention them in our customer newsletters and we do a lot of presentations through our school education program and to community groups, yeah, we're, you know, these are opportunities to talk about composting.

We also talked a lot about composting around Thanksgiving, as we approached Thanksgiving.

- (MIKE LAUGHS) Leftovers!

- Well, you know, Thanksgiving is the biggest food week of the year in this country.

- It's also the most treacherous holiday in the country.

- Well, but it's a really a great opportunity to have a conversation with people about farms and food and the importance of connecting ourselves, you know, with farms and gardening and food and the people who grow our food, and soil health and protecting the Earth.

I mean, the Earth is feeding us, it's helping produce the things we need to, you know, to survive - not only the food, but the air and the water, and we have to... We all are encouraged to do our part to protect the health of the planet, which is really protecting our own health.

- Well, that's an excellent way to end.

If people want more information about your specific group, Recology, where do they go?

- Well, our website is Recology.com.

And then, you know, you can also... We've got a lot of information on there.

We've also set up this website betteratthebin.com.

We encourage people to be better at the bin, and there are many other websites and resources to talk about composting and the benefits of composting.

You know, so people can just search that on the internet.

- Do you know, I wrote the book on composting Mike McGrath's Book of Compost.

Find it on Amazon.

You'll pay a fortune.

- Yeah.

Your book and other books.

- Have you read my book?

- I have not.

- I better order a copy.

But I'm going to do it through my local independent bookstore.

- There you go.

All right, sir.

Robert Reed will be listing a whole bunch of resources, not just about Recology, but about how this trend can spread.

Yeah, everything starts in California, but sooner or later it makes its way down to the masses.

And I love the idea.

A lot of my listeners want to compost, but don't have a clue.

And then they get into trouble.

I love the idea of somebody coming around on Friday morning compost.

Do you have any compost?

- Bless you for... You know, encouraging people to do their part and to feed that soil, and, you know, I think your book and your efforts and other efforts like what you're doing help people reconnect with farms.

And you know, if you go back a few generations, a lot more people worked on farms we were more connected to places that grow our food and then now we've crossed the point where most people live in cities, and I think it's important that we reconnect with farms, that we understand how nature works and we all do our part to make it work because we can't just we can't just take we have to participate to make it function correctly.

- Oh, God, let it be so.

All right, man.

Um, Robert Reed Recology... something just bit me.

Robert Reed, Recology.com I'm sure you'll find a bunch of stuff there.

And this is only the beginning of our celebration of Compost Week.

All right.

Robert Reed, Ducky.

Say goodbye.

- Quack quack.

- Watch out for the pellets.

You know, fly straight and.

- And um, this should be happening in every community and all of my people out there.

It's your job to get it started.

All right, Bob, we'll be talking to you again.

Maybe during... ♪ National Composting Week National Composting Week.

♪ So we just achieved a monumental show on the current stage of composting in America.

What can we follow that up with for a Question of the Week?

One of my most popular topics and one that should be repeated every time this year, is it good compost or is it bad compost?

Lucinda, in the ancient Philadelphia neighborhood of Germantown, writes I've been going to the recycling center in Fairmount Park and bringing home buckets of their free compost.

But as I listen to you more carefully, I'm wondering if the compost is full of pesticides and analysis from the soil lab at Penn State is posted at their website.

But I don't know how to make any sense of it.

Can you help?

I know I should just make my own, and I'm working on getting a worm bin set up.

Nobody makes enough of their own compost, Lucinda.

I have about 20 different systems working a gigantic circle of metal fencing filled with shredded leaves, smaller circles of welded wire fencing filled with shredded leaves and coffee grounds four big black plastic composters with locking lids that are filled with shredded leaves that I mix kitchen waste into and indoor stackable worm bin.

That processes most of our kitchen waste and last summer's tomato cages that I fill with shredded leaves in the fall, and yet I will barely have enough for my needs.

In fact, I'll probably have to import some myself this spring for a special project I'm doing.

I have three local sources to choose from a nearby garden center, a big mulch dealer that sells the premium compost and my local municipal... My local supply.

I'm getting a five gallon bucket from each and giving them all the enhanced duck test.

Retired University of Maryland compost guru Dr Frank Gohan taught me the basic three step compost test.

Does it smell like rich black soil?

Does it look like rich black soil?

And does it feel like rich black soil when you pick it up and squeeze it?

If all three answers are yes, it's a duck.

Which is to mean good compost.

Over the years, I added two other tests one to detect the persistent lawn grass herbicides that weren't around when I first spoke with Dr Gohan and one I created to test for possible weed seeds.

It's easy.

You fill two containers regular plant pots with good drainage with the compost in one, you plant a good amount of fresh seed.

The other one you leave naked.

Then you keep them both at room temperature and water them every day.

If the naked one stays naked, it's not weedy.

Good job.

If the seedlings germinate well in the 80% range or higher and the young plants look healthy.

Herbicides are not an issue.

Pea and bean seeds are supposed to be the best indicators of herbicide residues.

But the Penn State Soil Lab did a very similar germination test with the seeds of a classic cucumber variety market more 76.

My advice is just to use the freshest seeds you have on hand.

The results of that professional germination test my compost caught 100.

It sprouted just as many seeds and the seedlings were just as vigorous as seeds planted in a control of a bagged soil free starting mix.

And that's what Al Ratti of the US Composting Council said was the most significant number on their 13 page report.

The Philly compost grew seedlings perfectly.

And if seedlings grow perfectly, everything else is almost certainly going to grow well.

Remember, seedlings are the canaries in the coal mine, and Al said that 100% was really the only number he needed to see.

But the rest of the report did have what we call listing's of concern.

Things like soluble salts, fecal coliform, eek lead, mercury, zinc all very scary words.

When I read them, I yelled, I don't want any fecal coliform in my garden.

Well, good luck to me because it turns out that fecal coliform is present in every gram of soil on the planet.

The Fairmount Park compost had 25 milligrams per kilogram of lead.

The EPA limit is 300.

Fecal coliform was a 4.5 on a scale of 1000 units allowed, so I could have been a poopy 100 times worse and still be on the side of the angels.

My head was spinning, trying to figure this stuff out.

I looked up a lot of numbers on my own, but finally realized I had to ask for help.

And I'm the guy who wrote the best selling book on compost and who's Ted X talk on composting just passed a million views on YouTube.

So my relative inability to immediately interpret these test results showed me that quote Civilians have almost no chance, and I reacted just as emotionally to the line items like lead and arsenic that in reality were detected at levels the EPA and composting council consider incredibly low.

But to me, there were just scary words and random numbers on a page without any kind of context.

So what's a poor gardener to do?

Back to the enhanced duck test.

Don't even think about using compost that smells bad or looks bad, or that grows weeds or distorted seedlings.

Remember that all gardening is a crap-shoot.

There are no pristine areas left here on Krypton, and even compost that's only reasonably good is still 100 times better than chemical fertilizers.

And read up on these important subjects.

You'll find lots more info on these topics in our frequently asked section of You Bet Your Garden dot org.

Well, that sure was some timely info about compost care.

Luckily for you, we also have a special Question of the Week all about how to test for compost and topsoil before you bring it home.

You'll find this valuable advice in print at the Gardens live website to read it over at your leisure or your leisure.

Just click the link for the Question of the Week at our website, which is still and will forever be You Bet Your Garden dot org.

Gardens Alive supports the You Bet Your Garden Question of the Week, and you always find the latest Question of the Week at the Gardens Alive website.

You Bet Your Garden is a half hour public television show, an hour long public radio show and podcast all produced and delivered to you weekly from Universe Studios at Lehigh Valley Public Media in Bethlehem, PA. Our radio show is distributed by PRX, the Public Radio Exchange.

You Bet Your Garden was created by Mike McGrath.

Mike McGrath was created when an ancient wizard found him digging in the dirt and revealed to him the secrets of making super soil.

Yikes.

My producer is threatening to contaminate my compost if I don't get out of this studio.

Them's fighting words.

But we must be out of time so you can call us any time at 888 492 9444 or send us your mail and your tired, your poor, your wretched refuse teeming towards our garden shores at YBYB@WLVT.org.

You'll find all of this contact information, answers to all your garden questions, audio of this show, video of this show and our priceless podcast.

It's all at our website.

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I'm your host!

Mike McGrath celebrating compost every week and looking forward to our special welcome spring show with a bevy of dancing Morris men.

That's next week.