Composting indoors

[Meowmie]

Oh. my. gosh. Is that why she is your Ex?

 

[zigs]

Part of it

 

[Lostvalleyguy]

I live in a building with multiple units. My neighbours can't seen to separate their paper from their containers from their day-to-day garbage properly in the bins that we do have so setting up an outdoor compost for the building is out of the question.

I have been looking into indoor composting but have been concerned about the smell. I am pleased to hear that it isn't that noticeable. I generate a lot of coffee grounds and the remnants from my juicer look like great material. I was thinking of using a rubber (plastic) storage tub.

If anyone here knows of organic materials that should definitely be avoided, I would love to hear about it.

 

[zigs]

Don't put meat or fish into it, but most other stuff composts ok, the bad smells only come from anerobic decomposition.

 

[Meowmie]

I would go slowly, I think that, and the coffee grounds, are why it doesn't smell. I also stared with a base of potting soil that was depleted of nutrients so it was not just food waste in the bin. I don't add more than 1/8 cup of food scraps a day and I grind them up first. (I'm working with about a gallon of compost/dirt)

 

[happyflowerlady]

I think that this is a ood idea, and i don't see why it would not work well. My mother used to have a special little bucket that we put all of our veggie.fruit scraps in, plus she saved the newspapers, and we put it all on the compost pile that she had out back every day. Granted, this was outside, but still, i don't ever remember it having any kind of a bad smell, even in the heat of summer.
The earthworms loved it!
Mom would make a small make-shift fence around an area, and then start filling it in with the newspapers and compost material, plus we added some wood sawdust or shavings from time to time. When it got too full, then she would leave that one to work, and start another pile nearby.

 

[Meowmie]

I have a compost pile outside where most of my scraps go, but what I have inside is just a small food prep pan with compost in it of things that are carefully selected, originally to get me through the winter, revitalizing the dirt I need to consistently grow wheat grass for juicing.

Since I hate to buy bags of potting soil, and don't want to bring in compost or dirt from outside to grow my wheat grass on my counter, I have decided to keep this going year round.

I'm also tossing in Italian herbs from my herb plants. It's starting to take on a bit of a smell. Not much, and not at all offensive, but when my husband walked into the kitchen other day, right after I stirred my compost, he asked if I was making "Sunday gravy" (spaghetti sauce).

 

[khillis]

We compost, it's a great way to get nutrient-rich soil. Since my husband and I cook everyday; we tend to have a lot of compost waste. I usually keep a big bowl where I am preparing dinner; throwing all the trimmings and scraps into it. Once I am fully finished preparing (the bowl tends to fill up quickly; due to my high use of vegetables), I take the bowl around the side of our house. There we have a large compost bin that allows all the scraps to break-down into soil. It has a lid in which keeps it sealed from the elements. That way, we do not have compost sitting in the kitchen and we are utilizing it's use.

 

[Meowmie]

It's way to cold to go out to my compost pile where I live. Most of my scraps go into a larger container that sits on the back porch and when it gets full my husband will take it to the compost pile, or to the 5' high pile of snow that is sitting on the compost.

As I said in the beginning, I needed something to revitalize my soil that I was growing my wheat grass in. Even if I could handle the cold, with MS I don't have the strength to dig out the compost from under the snow. All I have is one small food prep pan with my dirt in it, where I compost well ground bit's of apple, coffee grounds, some herbs and a few other vegie scraps. It does not smell and looks like nothing than a small container with potting soil in it.

I'm rather regretful that I started this thread. I am not a slob with rotting food in my kitchen.

 

[burtpovski]

I'd probably NEVER do my composting indoors. It's pretty nasty to have fruit flies flying around your place while the compost is doing its thing. It's better to do it outside too because of more air flow. I don't think it really matters that much, but from my experience, it seems like it does. Also, compost does sort of ruin the air quality indoors, so I really just prefer to put my compost stuff outside.

 

[Meowmie]

LOL I didn't have trouble with fruit flies or anything and composting in the dead of winter when it was below zero outside wasn't an option. But hey, you all want to picture me sitting in a pile of rotted food with worms and fruit flies, have at it.

 

[zigs]

Time flies like an Arrow,

Fruit flies like a Banana.

 

[Meowmie]

And I don't put banana peels in my indoor compost. I put them in the ground by my roses, thank to a tip I got on here.

My compost had a lot of eggshells (washed and crushed) and coffee grounds, the recycled wheat grass roots and stumps and left overs from the grinder, and an odd carrot scraping, well minced.

Never was any smell or insects attracted to it, and it provided me with fortified soil for my wheat grass all winter long.

It was first started out of desperation (see original post) and I thought that in future years I would make sure I had the fertilizer and extra soil for the winter before it was off the shelves, but it worked so well I have ever intention of doing it again.

 

[zigs]

Been putting my Bananananana * peels next to my Tomato plants.


* Knows how to start spelling Banana, doesn't know how to stop.

 

[Meowmie]

They are good for tomatoes, too? I'll have to start putting them there. I'm never short on those peels. Bananananana is kind of fun to type.