If you love your garden and want to know a eco-friendly method of tending to it, go organic. Create organic manure using the waste from your kitchen.

Vijay Kumar, Bio-Agriculturist, who has been in this field of organic research for more than 20 years, says: "Organic manure enriches the micro organic fauna around the roots and enables the plant to use its genetic vigour and produce more. When spread out around plants, compost will continue to break down for years, providing long-term nutrition that your plants cannot get from any chemical fertilizer."

Vermicompost
The easiest method of making manure at home is the manufacture of vermicompost. Compost is organic material that has decomposed to become rich soil or mulch, according to Prasad of Karnataka Compost Development Corporation. How to do it? "Dig a pit with a minimum height of one-and-a-half feet. The width can vary depending on your convenience. Fill the pit with kitchen waste, strictly avoiding plastic and layer it with cow dung to enable faster decomposition. Adding a few earthworms to this will hasten the manufacture of compost". Earthworms for the compost can be procured from the University of Agricultural Sciences and the Karnataka Compost Development Corporation at Rs. 400 a kg. You may need quarter kg for your home garden. Waste particles spend only a few hours inside the earthworm's gut and most of the decomposition is actually carried out by micro-organisms, either before or after passing through the earthworm. Hence, earthworms accelerate decomposition rather than being the direct agent.

You may lay a new layer of waste on regular basis and the earthworms move upwards into the fresh waste to feed themselves and to process the material. Not only does compost provide rich nutrients and moisture to the plants in your garden, it also recycles the waste that you might otherwise discard. In addition to benefiting your plants and garden, you're also benefiting the environment as your compost reduces waste.

Wrong notion
If you've been contemplating starting your own compost heap, but are afraid it will cause your back yard to smell, you couldn't be more wrong. If aerated properly, compost should have a sweet smell.

In order to prevent the stench of rotting food, you'll want to avoid putting meat, fish or the faeces of carnivorous animals into your compost heap. Here is a brief list of things ideal for composting:

Green matter: grass clippings, tree and other yard trimmings, vegetable peelings and waste, rotten fruits, weeds and leftovers.

Brown matter: leaves, nut shells, saw dust, shredded wood, dead flowers and plants, and straw.

Others: Manure from plant-eating animals such as cow or sheep, egg shells, tea bags, coffee grinds, hair, charcoal, used coffee filters, feathers, cotton rags and string.

For a compost pile to work properly, it must have the proper mixture of green and brown ingredients in alternating layers, with the other waste thrown in for good measure.

To keep the pile warm and damp, it must be turned regularly with a shovel or pitchfork and watered to retain dampness. It takes at least six weeks for the organic material to compost enough to use in your garden, but it's recommended you wait at least a few months.

When your compost heap takes on a dark colour, a crumbly texture and an earthy smell, you should consider this as a good indication it's ready to mix into your soil.

NSKE (Neem Seed Kernel Extract) is another type of manure that can be made at home. The kernel of the neem seed is tied in a transparent cloth to permit aeration. This is soaked in water for two days. It can then be crushed and added to the roots to strengthen them against infection and permit good growth.