♻️ Composting & Smart Plant Buying

🚫 Buy Smart: Avoid Invasive Plants

Some plants sold at big stores escape the garden and take over Ohio's woods, fields, and wetlands — crowding out the native plants that birds, bees, and butterflies depend on. More than 60 are now illegal to sell in Ohio. A little homework before you buy protects your yard, your neighbors, and our local habitat.

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🌿 What to know before you buy:

• Ohio bans the sale of dozens of invasive plants. Well-known examples: Callery / "Bradford" pear, bush honeysuckle, autumn olive, multiflora rose, purple loosestrife, and tree-of-heaven. You shouldn't see these for sale — if you do, skip them.

• Still widely sold, but invasive — best avoided: burning bush (winged euonymus), Japanese barberry, wintercreeper and Chinese silvergrass (miscanthus). They spread into natural areas even though stores still carry them.

• Why it matters: invasives spread fast (often by birds eating the berries), have no natural checks here, and replace the native plants our pollinators and wildlife need.

• Buy smart: ask whether a plant is native or non-invasive, choose a well-behaved alternative, and never dump yard waste or pond plants into natural areas.

• Ask us! We're always glad to suggest a non-invasive or native plant that gives you the same look and color without the trouble.

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Check the official lists: Ohio Dept. of Agriculture — Invasive Plants, and OSU Extension — Invasive Species.

♻️ Composting — Turn Scraps into Garden Gold

Compost feeds your soil, holds moisture, loosens heavy clay like ours, and keeps kitchen and yard waste out of the landfill. It's easy once you know the recipe.

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THE RECIPE: about 3 parts browns to 1 part greens

🟫 Browns (carbon): fall leaves, straw, shredded cardboard and plain newspaper, wood chips, dried plant stems.

🟩 Greens (nitrogen): vegetable and fruit scraps, coffee grounds and filters, tea leaves, fresh grass clippings, garden trimmings, crushed eggshells.

🚫 Keep out: meat, fish, bones, dairy, oils and greasy food, pet or human waste, diseased plants, weeds gone to seed, and anything treated with weed killer.

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HOW TO DO IT

1. Pick a spot. A bin or pile about 3×3×3 feet in partial sun, on bare soil, close enough that you'll use it.

2. Layer it. Start with coarse browns for airflow, then alternate greens and browns. Chop big pieces — smaller bits break down faster.

3. Keep it damp like a wrung-out sponge. Too dry and it stops; too wet and it smells.

4. Turn it every 1–2 weeks with a fork to add air. A healthy pile heats up in the middle.

5. Harvest. In 2–6 months you'll have dark, crumbly, earthy-smelling compost at the bottom. Screen out chunks and toss them back in.

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TROUBLESHOOTING

• Smells sour or rotten → too wet or too many greens: add browns and turn it.

• Not breaking down → too dry or too many browns: add water and greens.

• Critters → bury food scraps in the center and keep meat and dairy out.

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HOW TO USE IT

Mix 2–3 inches into garden beds before planting, top-dress around perennials and shrubs in spring, or blend about 1 part compost to 3 parts potting mix for containers.

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Short on space? Leaf mold (a pile of shredded fall leaves left for a year) and worm bins work great too.