Name: Composting for soil and community health.
Start: 2026-02-27T10:00:00+00:00
End: 2026-02-27T15:30:00+00:00
Location: Hydebank Community Garden

Composting for soil and community health.

This session will compare heap and Johnson-Su composting systems and look at the benefits and practicalities of community composting.
About this Event

A practical workshop exploring both turned heap composting and the Johnson -Su bioreactor, with demonstrations and Guidance for community scaled systems. You can read a little about Johnson-Su below. We will also look at how food waste, municipal composting and local growing fit within wider ecological and social systems.

The sesion will be delivered by Neil Dowson from Divergent Growth, based at Hydebank Community Garden.

Lunch will be provided.

This workshop is generously supported by The National Lottery Awards for All Fund. Thankyou to Diverse Life and Groundwork NI for providing the venue.

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Johnson Su compost is made using a completely aerobic no-turn method of heap construction. The pile is built on a standard pallet in a wire and W**d membrane cage with 6 drainage pipe "chimneys" so that no part of the heap is more than 30cm from the air. It usually takes an afternoon to build a heap with a number of people filling it with soaked carbon-rich matter. 48 hrs later the drainage pipes are removed and the heap is left to work away for the next 16 months, being checked regularly to make sure it never dries out. It produces a fabulous very friable earth-like compost that contains up to 140 species of fungal spore and bacteria, making it an amazing innoculant for remediating degraded soil.