That's it -- I'm giving up on composting (rant)

[Nestof3]

1. We have mosquitoes swarming and I assume hatching out all over our compost piles.

 

2. My husband put a top-dressing of compost down on our lawn and now we have tiny tomato plants and weeds coming up in our lawn.

 

So, eventhough the compost looks completely composted, obviously it isn't real compost because seeds are living in it. It decomposes, but never heats up. I feel I put a ton of green stuff in it considering I am constantly mixing in our food scraps (veggies, fruit, egg shells, coffee).

 

I don't want to water it b/c of the money and b/c I'm assuming we'll get even more mosquitoes. It's just so hard to start throwing veggie scraps in the trash can.

 

I'm sad. I loved composting, but the mosquitoes have become unbearable and I am not going to waste time composting something that really isn't compost.

 

My husband's in the lawn maintenance business, and now we have these stupid tomato plants coming up in our front lawn! :smash:

[Renthead Mommy]

Try a bokashi bucket! It's Japanese indoor composting. You put your scraps in your bucket, and spead EM on it (micro organisms) and they basically 'pickle' your scraps. Then you bury the scraps directly into your garden. Or if you throw them out into the trash, they don't rot and give off methane gas because they've been pickled or something like that.

 

Plus it makes 'bokashi juice' which is great fertlizer that you mix with your watering can for all your plants and veggies.

 

When you google it, look for the NZ/Austrial sites. That's where my friend got most of her info. Plus it's in English, not Japanese!

[Brigitte]

That's not as bad as my parents. My step-father had a fancy composting container in their suburban back yard and they ended up with RATS!!!

[TraceyS/FL]

Note to self: STOP reading the composting messages you are reading NOW... although, i have dirt and weeds in my yard - maybe tomatoes wouldn't be so bad?!

 

Major bummer..... i can't figure out what the heck i have that i can add to the pile - i'm missing some piece of the puzzle i think.

[Peela]

I think there is quite an art to compost- it needs just teh right ingredients. I am not really up to it, myself...our scraps go to the chickens though so they are not wasted.

[In The Great White North]

I loved composting, but the mosquitoes have become unbearable and I am not going to waste time composting something that really isn't compost.

 

Mosquitoes? How wet is your compost? Do you put leaves and grass clippings in or just food scraps? Have you tried putting a thin layer of dirt on every now and again? I've heard of people putting a sheet or two of newspaper in between all the "green" stuff; you could try that. We've never had a problem with mosquitoes in the compost but ours is mostly yard waste (weeds, leaves, etc. We don't pick up grass clippings.)

 

The secret to killing all the seeds is time. Don't rush it. If you let compost sit for a couple of years, without any effort at all, you can have nice, weed free compost. Since the seeds are so small, you're unlikely to see them when you shovel itout. I have two piles, so one can compost while I'm still throwing stuff on the other. I've seen yards with 3, all at different stages of "readiness."

 

Turning, watering and all the other labor intensive techniques just speed things up. (Although turning might help with the mosquitoes!)

[PariSarah]

That seems to keep the bugs down for us--every time I add a layer of green stuff, I make sure to throw some brown stuff (straw, dried leaves) or even just dirt to cover the greens.

 

I'm sorry your first effort didn't go as planned. :sad:

[unsinkable]

We have a compost tumbler and my dh has a thermometer. The temperature spikes, then plummets, then it's done. The number of days this takes depends on the ambient temp. Never had a prob with bugs or vermin.

 

Before dh got the thermometer, he went by look and we got a pumpkin plant the next year.

[Sunny]

Do you put dry stuff in too? You need leaves or such.

We got rats because we put food in the pile, but never mosquitos. We just ignored them, they would run away when we opened the lid. Do you have worms? We had lots of worms eating up the stuff, and it really heated up and deteriorated nicely.. We also added in horse manure. It was a heating factor. We didn't water it though.

Don't give up!

[KS_]

1. We have mosquitoes swarming and I assume hatching out all over our compost piles.

 

I'm sad. I loved composting, but the mosquitoes have become unbearable and I am not going to waste time composting something that really isn't compost.

 

 

 

Can mosquitoes actually hatch from compost? I always thought they needed standing water, not just moisture that might be present in a compost pile. . .

 

I gave up trying to get a really hot pile here - for a large enough pile, we would have to put it at the back of the yard, which made it really difficult to water (we get about 10" precip a year, so I needed to water it), and so it never did anything. I changed and made a small pile out of an upside down plastic garbage can with the bottom cut out, and moved it to where it would get watered when I watered the lawn. It's not a fast/hot pile, but it does eventually compost.

 

I also do a lot of sheet composting - putting the scraps right into my garden beds, or flower beds. If it's something like fruit that will attract bugs, I will put some dirt over it. But things like veggie peels I just leave. It's easy and as long as you don't keep piling on the scraps in the same place, it breaks down pretty quickly and isn't unsightly.

[Nestof3]

Answers to questions:

 

Our compost is very rarely wet, which I am learning is one of the problems. The matter needs to be as wet as a squeezed out sponge, but I never water it, and we don't get much rain.

 

This is what I put in my compost:

 

dirt and flowers from pots (annuals and dead things)

leaves

results of dead-heading, plant trimming, etc.

fruit and veggie scraps, coffee and filters, egg shells

paper from paper shredder

stuff I sweep off the deck

 

I am very often adding food scraps (we eat lots of fruits and veggies, and my mom gives me her coffee). I dig a hole, dump our bucket of scraps in, and cover the hole. I thought I had enough greens, but from what I read, a lack of heating of the pile is caused by 4 things:

 

1. lack of oxygen from not turning over the pile

2. the pile not being big enough (ours is -- I have a 3-bin system, each bin being about 4' wide, 3' high)

3. not enough water

4. not enough greens

 

The food scraps do break down incredibly quickly!

 

Our compost is loaded with worms! I moved everything from one bin to another today in an effort to turn it nicely. It took some time, but I was so excited to see so many worms! I also watered it down when I was finished.

 

I think I just need to give it much more time since it's not heating up to kill the seeds. I would like to tweak it until it does heat up enough, though.

 

BTW -- We had seen rats in our yard from when we fed the birds. We did see one on our compost pile once, but I do try to dig deeply to add our scraps and always cover with dirt and browns. We keep rat poison under out deck b/c that is a very popular place for rats to live. I think the rats initially moved in b/c of our neighbor behind us. His yard is unsightly and full of hiding places. I did not see any signs of rats today when I was working with the compost.

 

I also read that some think mosquitoes hatch in compost, while many think they only linger around compost piles b/c they are often in shady places that mosquitoes like to hang around during the day. I do plan to turn much more often though, just in case.

 

Thanks for all of your suggestions!

[kalanamak]

It's just so hard to start throwing veggie scraps in the trash can.

 

 

Worm bin.

[Nestof3]

Worm bin.

 

I did consider this when I started on my composting journey, but we have very little extra space inside AND we dispose of a very large quantity of food scraps.