outdoor composting

I think about doing this. every. year.
'fraid rats.

Thanks for posting it -- I hope someone does compost and can tell us the rats really do leave them alone if they refrain from putting egg shells in the bin (or whatever)

vermiculture. you can get the worms at the farmers market from a groupd based in the LES. the worms are kept in a bin inside - they can't escape! and then use their poop to fertilize your plants. for real.

greenermjr wrote: We started composting last year in a bin I bought at the Botanic Garden flower sale. I haven't really gotten a finished batch out yet, but I don't get rats, from what I can tell. I put in fruit/veggie waste, rice/bread/pasta, and egg shells. No vermiculture, except for whoever is already slithering around back there.

why don't you have a batch yet?

pete_c wrote:
My understanding was that you needed at least a full year.

:shock:

even with worms?

We have been composting for several years. To get really good compost you should use a combination of yard waste and food scrapes (never meat or fish). If you don't put out meat or fish you don't get critters, they leave it alone. We put all of our vegetable waste, fruit (including rinds) corn cobs, corn husks, rice, coffee grounds etc. into the compost. It really cuts down on the amount of trash we put out every week. It needs to be watered and kept moist. I generally soak it good with the hose every couple of weeks. It also needs to be turned every few weeks. I understand that if you turn it more often, say every couple of days, it will break down faster and you'll have it faster. I'm just to lazy to do that. In general we feed it all spring and summer and into the fall, then reap several cubic yards of compost that we spread at the end of the season for the following season. We just use one of those big black plastic boxes, I think they cost about $60 dollars (although I am thinking of getting a tumbler so I won't have to deal with turning it manually with a pitchfork anymore). It will also work faster if you can put it in the sun. It's the combination of the moistness and the heat that breaks down everything. It will actually get very hot in the middle of the pile if it is working right.