Three easy steps to composting!

The lovely Karen at The Rubbish Diet has asked me to talk about compost.

I can just see your eyes glazing over now.

Wait! Don't hit delete.

Composting is easy. If I can do it then the barrier to entry is obviously not very high ;-)

1. We have this little caddy that sits on our kitchen counter. All of our non-cooked and non-meat kitchen waste goes into this little caddy. I even put in paper towels, tissues, children's art, the fluff from the dryer filter, hair that is stuck around the brush, the dirt inside the Dyson...

2. Every couple of days I empty it in our compost bin (which was subsidised by the county council). We try to have a good mix of "green" and "brown" waste. It's winter now, so the bin is full. In the summer it goes down very quickly.

3. In a few months .... depending on the weather ... out comes compost which I use in the garden for my veggies.

I've been doing this for nearly three years now and I've seen it all (including rats!) If you have any Qs, leave them below and I'll try to answer...

Comments

[TheMadHouse]

we compost too and it is great. We have a caddy in the kitchen. We also have a little pot for all the tea bags too.

My neighbours have two tumbler bins a nd it makes compost really fast, I am very envious!!

[emma]

It is a good idea to turn it regularly to aid the breakdown process and to deter pests like rats from taking up residence in a nice warm bin! Remember also to balance out a lot of grass cuttings with torn paper for example. All good stuff! Emma x

[Emily O]

I love composting and have two of those dalek bins. It reduces your household waste by a lot.

[cartside]

I always wonder how to turn the compost in these bins - or does it work without turning? We have one, and it's full, but the compost turned out to be a bit slimy. So I'm reluctant now - don't know if I can use the slimy compost or not, or how to start again and do it better.

[Muddling Along Mummy]

I run two composting bins - the kitchen waste one which the council collect and my proper compost heap for garden bits (the kitchen waste meant the rat problem up here had got a bit out of control!)

[Almost Mrs Average]

I love you even more now Susanna for showing your compost bin. That looks just like mine. In fact we've got two of them and since we started growing our own we now use it in our small vegetable patch too. Before that we just used to add it as mulch to our flower bed. Like TheMadHouse, I think a tumbler would be composting heaver :-)

[Metropolitan Mum]

Slimy compost? Mhm. Why am I not tempted?

[michelle]

ohh, nowhere to hide that in my garden! I can just imagine the twins playing with it! ummm nice. Lucky the council take away our food waste. Mich x

[SmartLivingDiva]

I really got into composting (in a non-tragic way!) but since getting chickens last year my compost bin is just permanently overflowing and I've got nowhere to put it all - it doesn't seem to compost down fast enough to use! Any tips?

[A Modern Mother]

Smart Diva -- get another bin? I wish I had chickens... great notrogen source

[Online Consultation]

Thanks for the reminders on how to compost. In this manner we can help mother earth just for a little it,

[Rosie Scribble]

Mmm. I think you may have converted me. So where can I get a little caddy like that from? And will it make my kitchen smell?

[Yvette]

So can you not put all your cooked scraps in the compost bin as well? We always have left-overs on the children's plates...

[Yvette]

Rosie - our local council gave us all kitchen caddies for food scraps. The lid on it seems to keep the smells in (unless it's overloaded which happens often as I'm too lazy!)

[Home Baked]

I'm just about to start composting up at my allotment - there was a compost bin already on it when we took it on last year made out of wooden slats. Am wondering if it needs a lid?

[A Modern Mother]

@homebaked lids are a great deterrent for rodents, otherwise compost needs air!