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I've been on forums where passions ran high about composting: one guy claimed that the only Real Compost was compost made His Way (and he had some unusual notions).
Some people love big, hot heaps with careful C/N ratios and say they kill more weed seeds and soil diseases.
Most people only have small heaps that never get very hot or even noticeably warm, and they compost slower.
Some bury their compost makings in holes and cover them.
Some do sheet composting on top of the soil.
Some do sheet composting on top of the soil, and plant in it, and call that lasagna gardening.
Some of us can't make enough compost, and buy it by the bag (that includes me - I can't find or beg enough makings).
Every single composting method works well.
Big, hot, well-balanced heaps do compost faster and maybe do kill more weed seeds.
Small heaps get the job done somewhat slower, or maybe much slower. But you can use compost before it is completely "finished". It isn't as pretty, and releases its nutrients and water-holding humus slower. If you had a lot of paper, sawdust and wood shavings, they might still be sucking nitrogen out of the soil if you use it TOO early.
OK, that's as concise as I can be at one time! Now I have to run on and on and on. Sorry about that, but you can skim over it!
All the methods that don't need no stinking compost heaps have one thing in common: they don't lose ANY of the nutrients from their raw materials. Compost heaps that digest the organic matter for months do allow some "good stuff" to drip out the bottom.
If you spot compost, sheet compost, or "lasagna" (can that be a verb?) , all such "drippings" are provided immediately to plants or local soil microorganisms right where they will do the most good.
If you feed the soil organisms, they will feed the plants. As far as I know, the only way to have healthy, fertile soil is to keep the soil microbes happy. Not only are there known beneficial bacteria, fungi and tiny insects, but when they tried to figure out how many kinds of soil life there are that microbiologists have not yet identified andf studied to death, they found that only TEN PERCENT of all soil microbes can even be cultured in a lab. A full NINETY PERCENT of all soil life is so inter-dependent that we can't even get them to grow in petri dishes, let alone know "all about them".
Life is complicated! The wonderful thing is that gardeners are much better at tthis than microbiologhists: we know that if we provide compost or even the raw materials for making compost, to soil, t6he soil life adapts and thrives and encourages plants to thrive. The network of soil organisms know how to get along, and thrive on almost any conduitions that include enough water, enough auir, and any organic matter.
There's only two things I can say against spot-sheet-lasagna methods:
1) if you use TOO MUCH paper or sawdust or finely shaved wood,
AND turn it under the soil so that it sits in the root zone,
Then small decomposing wood particles will stimulate soil microbes to faster growth and extra consumption of nitrogen.
Microbes are better at scavenging nitrogen than plant roots, so they will startve the plants, at least a little, unless you can continuously add soluble nitrogen in exactly the right amount to slake the microbes but not overwhelm the roots. That is impractical with chemical fertilizers. if you have SO much comost that you can add a large amount of it to provide SO MUCH N that even the soil microbes are slaked, wel, why bother burying excess sawdust and paper? let it compost for a while first!
BTW, if you have lots of paper or sawdust but want to use it faster than heap-composting allows, TOP DRESS with it. That way it is not in the root zone and can't starve the roots. Soil microbes have little accesws to the above-soil layer, it becomes a fine mulch. You just have to keep fine mulch from turnin to mush or a solid layer that interferes with air and rain percolating into soil.
2) Those aren't the ways that I started composting, and I am stuck in my ways. I love my heap! I cultivate my heap for 6-9 months, and I cultivate my soil lovingly with as much compost as I can make or afford. Then, good luck to the plants, they can grow well if they want to, and I appreciate their good efforts, but I Really Love My Heap.
