What to Compost?

I came across an article on PlanetGreen.Discovery.com called "75 Things You Can Compost, But Thought You Couldn't". It's a fantastic list. Here are some of the things I didn't know about (and there are alot of them!):

FROM THE KITCHEN:

• Used paper napkins
• Pizza boxes, ripped into smaller pieces
• Paper bags, either ripped or balled up
• Paper towel rolls
• Used paper plates (as long as they don't have a waxy coating)
• Cellophane bags (be sure it's really Cellophane and not just clear plastic—there's a difference.)
• Nut shells (except for walnut shells, which can be toxic to plants)
• Pizza crusts
• Cereal boxes (tear them into smaller pieces first)
• Wine corks
• Moldy cheese
• Melted ice cream
• Old jelly, jam, or preserves
• Stale beer and wine
• Toothpicks
• Bamboo skewers
• Paper cupcake or muffin cups

FROM THE BATHROOM:

• Used facial tissues
• Hair from your hairbrush
• Toilet paper rolls
• Old loofahs
• Nail clippings
• Urine
• 100% Cotton cotton balls
• Cotton swabs made from 100% cotton and cardboard (not plastic) sticks
• Latex condoms
• Cardboard Tampon Applicators

Random Stuff:

• Dryer lint
• Old/stained cotton clothing—rip or cut it into smaller pieces
• Old wool clothing—rip or cut it into smaller pieces
• Pencil shavings
• Sticky notes
• Contents of your vacuum cleaner bag or canister
• Used matches
• Fur from the dog or cat brush
• Droppings and bedding from your rabbit/gerbil/hamsters, etc.
• Newspaper/droppings from the bottom of the bird cage
• Feathers
• Alfalfa hay or pellets (usually fed to rabbits)
• Rawhide dog chews
• Fish food
• Dry dog or cat food

Our pile is going to get so much bigger now!

Composting: It's a Process

Our composting has begun but, I must say, it's not the magical experience I've been reading about on blogs.

a) it does smell
b) we have LOTS of flies

I am now realizing that all of the blogging about how great composting is...the nature of it all...reminds me of what we read about breast-feeding. "Oh, the intense bond", "it's natural", "it's healthy", "it's so easy"... Breast-feeding was certainly NOT easy. At least, in the beginning. And I guess once we all figured out what we were doing, it became easy..ish... I'm hoping for the same results with composting!

MY PROBLEMS (and possible solutions):

• a) The Smell. I remembered from what I read, I need a good mix of greens & browns. The pile was mostly appropriate food waste and it just looked like it needed some dry leafy matter. I mixed in some already decomposing leaves, and sort of cut everything up into smaller bits and the smell was gone in a couple of hours.
  


• b) The Flies. After I added the brown matter, mixed the pile, I covered it with a kitchen garbage bag. It's a temporary solution but it worked!



• c) I have no heat from my heap! When I hold my hand close to the pile...nada, nothing, zilch. I believe I need green matter, specifically lawn waste. The coolness of my pile makes complete sense given that I haven't mowed the lawn in three weeks! Oh boy do I have a chore ahead of me tomorrow. I dropped the push mower at the shop to get the blades sharpened so, with any luck, my pile will be nice and hot by Tuesday.

• d) The refuse from my huge clearing! After reading Margaret Roach's column about how she effectively chopped down her HUGE compost pile of sticks, leaves, and branches I'm going to give that a go this weekend as well. I have the space to build a pile dedicated to the batch of stuff. Might as well see what happens.

• (NOTE: This photo shows one of the two piles of refuse I'm going to try to compost. There's plenty of aggressive, strong, down-right mean bouganvillea branches in there. I suspect they won't breakdown at all and will thousands of years from now be harvested as weapons of war. )

Compost: The Beginning

THIS AREA WILL SOON BE HOME TO OUR COMPOST PILE!!!


We're joining the movement!

For the last two years, everyone we know has bragged and sometimes griped about their compost. We've watched as friends worked their way through two or three different compost bins, talked about the joys of "tea", and swore up one side and down the other that "compost doesn't smell". (BTW, we still don't believe that).

Lots of internet research, field research amongst our friends, and questions about the smelliness of compost piles and here's what we've decided:

As wanna-be DIY'ers, we're going to go the fencing and chicken wire route! We're drawing up the very simple plans now for a two-compartment compost heap in the the ridiculously overgrown patch of weeds and God-knows-what-else behind the garage that we have to clear out this weekend.

All I can say about the idea of us & composting...this ought to be good! We may have to post videos!