Composting and decomposition-rate comparison

Where to buy & price

Just examples of where to look and roughly what to expect to pay, get everything from wherever works for you, at whatever price you find.

Free, food scraps on hand, soil (garden or ~KSh 50–100/bag if bought), reused container.

Cold storage / timing

None.

Reagents & materials required

Procedure, step by step

1. 1

   Collect several different organic materials to test, for example a fruit or vegetable peel, a piece of bread, a leaf, and optionally a small piece of meat or dairy.

2. 2

   Note the approximate starting size of each sample, and photograph them together for a baseline.

3. 3

   Bury each sample separately in its own small container of soil, at a similar depth, and label each container clearly.

4. 4

   Keep the soil consistently moist, not soaked, and store all the containers somewhere warm.

5. 5

   Every 3–4 days, carefully dig up each sample, observe and photograph its condition, then rebury it.

6. 6

   Note visible changes: shrinking size, mold growth, color change, or complete breakdown.

7. 7

   Continue observations for 2–3 weeks, recording which material decomposed fastest and which was slowest.