The Composter's Lounge

[washing machine]

I have started composting

[The Argonaut]

Yup, food scraps and coffee grounds go in the compost container instead of the trash, get mixed in with a bunch of leaves and stuff in the backyard bin, and it will all hopefully turn into healthy soil for the garden. I'm still very much in a learning phase

[washing machine]

What's your compost bin setup like? I am interested as well. Mainly I'm curious if I can use lawn trimmings as my "dead leaves" portion.

[The Argonaut]

My understanding is that you can put any dead plants in there. I think you're supposed to strive for a 3:1 ratio of brown:green, or carbon-heavy stuff versus nitrogen-heavy stuff. And grass ends up being more "green", like food scraps. So I'd think you'd need to find something "brown" as well to be the base of your pile. There are a lot of options, though. It's easy up here in the northeast where there is a never ending supply of dead leaves

[E.H. Ruddock]

We compost, although in humidity it isn't as fast a process

[96583UP]

do you get a lot of flies? my neighbor has one and i dunno if he is doing it by the book but i walked close to it and a million flies were buzzing around and i was like welp that's kinda gross

[knee tunes]

there's flies in the compots

I can hearr em buzzin'

& I ain't done nothing

since I woke up to-day

[The Argonaut]

I think flies are a sign that something is going wrong. I had some flies one time when I didn't bury some scraps deep enough in the leaves. But I fixed that and no more flies

[wease]

What's your compost bin setup like? I am interested as well. Mainly I'm curious if I can use lawn trimmings as my "dead leaves" portion.

Lawn trimmings are a no-no. Leave those in the yard. That’s the best food for your lawn. Thanks, Mike McGrath!!

[The Argonaut]

Yeah, I'm of the mind that unless you are dealing with some fascist homeowners association, it's best to just shoot the grass out of the mower because cut grass is good for the lawn and it disappears very quickly

[washing machine]

I might try that next time. The bag attached to my mower isn't that good anyway.

[Norah]

If you're gonna do that you can't let it grow too long before mowing.

[96583UP]

If you're gonna do that you can't let it grow too long before mowing.

wisdom

[washing machine]

I typically mow every Saturday.

[E.H. Ruddock]

Threw some banana peels in the bin today

[doug rr]

ours is pretty full right now..i just give it a few spins every couple days now

[tragabigzanda]

from the ashes of tonkotsu

[wease]

The previous owner left a bin but we’ve not added anything to it yet.

[doug rr]

we got a miracle gro one last year...i think 20 something gallon..its been fine so far

[wease]

Ours is just a stationary Rubbermaid bin.