Beyond Kitchen Waste: When Compost Happens

Theatre Tickets? Leather Watch Bands?

You'd be surprised what you can put in your compost.  Take a look at this list from Alaska gardening author Marion Owens.  You might want to check out her website as well. 

There are some items on here I think I'd skip, especially that last one.  Urine? Uh, No thanks. But you can read why she uses it at her website.

By the way, she suggests using the contents of the vacuum bag, but living in Florida,  we know that the Flea is a 4 letter word and toxic to our environment. (My opinion anyway, wouldn't you agree?)

Since they typically survive a trip in the vacuum bag, I don't want to take a chance on having them hop around our compost.  They might hop out before the heat gets to them!

So here's your list, folks. And by the way, I'm curious.  How many of you compost at home?  Or do you buy it instead?  Also, how many of you will be planting vegetables this season?

Marion Owen's 163 Things You Can Compost:
(comments in parenthesis are from Marion... ;) )
Paper napkins          
          Freezer-burned vegetables
          Burlap coffee bags
          Pet hair
          Potash rock
          Post-it notes
          Freezer-burned fruit
          Wood chips
          Bee droppings
          Lint from behind refrigerator
          Hay
          Popcorn (unpopped, 'Old Maids,' too)
          Freezer-burned fish
          Old spices
          Pine needles
          Leaves
          Matches (paper or wood)
          Seaweed and kelp
          Hops          
          Chicken manure
          Leather dust
          Old, dried up and faded herbs
          Bird cage cleanings
          Paper towels
          Brewery wastes
          Grass clippings
          Hoof and horn meal
          Molasses residue
          Potato peelings
          Unpaid bills
          Gin trash (wastes from cotton plants)
          Weeds
          Rabbit manure
          Hair clippings from the barber
          Stale bread
          Coffee grounds
          Wood ashes
          Sawdust
          Tea bags and grounds
          Shredded newspapers
          Egg shells
          Cow manure
          Alfalfa
          Winter rye
          Grapefruit rinds
          Pea vines
          Houseplant trimmings
          Old pasta
          Grape wastes
          Garden soil
          Powdered/ground phosphate rock
          Corncobs (takes a long time to decompose)
          Jell-o (gelatin)
          Blood meal
          Winery wastes
          Spanish moss
          Limestone
          Fish meal
          Aquarium plants          
          Beet wastes
          Sunday comics
          Harbor mud
          Felt waste
          Wheat straw
          Peat moss
          Kleenex tissues
          Milk (in small amounts)
          Soy milk          
          Tree bark
          Starfish (dead ones!)
          Melted ice cream
          Flower petals
          Pumpkin seeds
          Q-tips (cotton swabs: cardboard, not plastic sticks)
          Expired flower arrangements
          Elmer's glue
          BBQ'd fish skin
          Bone meal
          Citrus wastes
          Stale potato chips
          Rhubarb stems
          Old leather gardening gloves      
          Tobacco wastes
          Bird guano
          Hog manure
          Dried jellyfish
          Wheat bran
          Guinea pig cage cleanings
          Nut shells
          Cattail reeds
          Clover
          Granite dust
          Moldy cheese
          Greensand
          Straw
          Shredded cardboard
          Dolomite lime
          Cover crops
          Quail eggs (OK, I needed a 'Q' word)
          Rapeseed meal
          Bat guano
          Fish scraps
          Tea bags (black and herbal)
          Apple cores
          Electric razor trimmings
          Kitchen wastes
          Outdated yogurt
          Toenail clippings
          Shrimp shells
          Crab shells
          Lobster shells
          Pie crust
          Leather wallets
          Onion skins
          Bagasse (sugar cane residue)
          Watermelon rinds
          Date pits
          Goat manure
          Olive pits
          Peanut shells
          Burned oatmeal (sorry, Mom)
          Lint from clothes dryer
          Bread crusts
          Cooked rice
          River mud
          Tofu (it's only soybeans, man!)
          Wine gone bad (what a waste!)
          Banana peels
          Fingernail and toenail clippings
          Chocolate cookies
          Wooden toothpicks
          Moss from last year's hanging baskets
          Stale breakfast cereal
          Pickles
'Dust bunnies' from under the bed
    Pencil shavings
    Wool socks
    Artichoke leaves
    Leather watch bands
    Fruit salad
    Tossed salad (now THERE's tossing it!)
    Brown paper bags
    Soggy Cheerios
    Theater tickets
    Lees from making wine
    Burned toast
    Feathers
    Animal fur
          Horse manure
          Vacuum cleaner bag contents
          Coconut hull fiber
          Old or outdated seeds
          Macaroni and cheese
          Liquid from canned vegetables
          Liquid from canned fruit
          Old beer
          Wedding bouquets
          Greeting card envelopes
          Snow
          Dead bees and flies
          Horse hair
          Peanut butter sandwiches
          Dirt from soles of shoes, boots
          Fish bones
          Ivory soap scraps
          Spoiled canned fruits and vegetables
          Produce trimmings from grocery store
          Cardboard cereal boxes (shredded)
          Grocery receipts
          Urine

Comments

[dani813]

We've composted for years now.Last year we got one of those nifty bins from the extension building when they were having classes.Keeps everything tidy for us.The end product ends up in my veggie garden.I've found that keeping a bucket with a lid on it in the kitchen helps with all the daily scraps and then I just empty it in the compost at the end of the day.

[pam]

I do not compost, I do not plant veggies... heck, I don't plant anything; I've got all I can do to keep what I have cut down. ;)

I am surprised to see any kind of poop in the list, since the last list I looked at vehemently denied fecal matter should be in one's compost heap.

[kenju]

I don't grow anything that needs compost, although I may start this year. My cleaning woman composts, and I save 2-3 zipper bags of refuse for her every week. It makes me feel like I am doing something good for the environment.

[FC]

I just sling stuff off the porch and into the woods.
Always seems to be gone the next day.

[SwampAngel65]

I started composting a few months ago. I keep a small bucket with a lid outside and when I think about it, I throw all my kitchen scraps in it, except for ANY meats. I plan on starting a vegetable garden soon, but unfortunately, my little compost pile isn't big enough to do much good yet.

[Janet]

I don't, but I'd really like to. I do have a garden...and I've never done anything to it other than grow stuff. Obviously, I need help!

" Unpaid bills " ... hahaha!

[Seamus]

We've yet to start a compost pile (is on the "to-do" list though), but we are doing a voluntary recycle program and cut what goes to the dump by 4/5ths.

[Deana]

I've tried a little compost pile but I keep forgetting to buy cover for it so it doesn't do anything!

[Linda/RV Vagabonds]

Hard to compost living the RV lifestyle, but did it when we owned a house. As to the fleas in the vacuum cleaner bag? Buy a flea collar, snip it into 2 inches sections, stretch one section to activate it and then drop it (one section only) into your vacuum cleaner bag. Voila'--kills the fleas that continue to live in the bag feeding off whatever.

[thingfish23]

We've composted here since moving in and starting our garden. Though I will admit to occasionally micturating out-of-doors, I have yet to point the stream towards the compost heap. That's one to remember.

Having a chicken coop gives us extra material to put on the garden as well, but composting chicken poop (and hay) is dodgy business. One misstep and you have a compost heap full of fly larvae and other creatures that are decidedly LESS cute than earthworms.

Best thing about our compost - volunteer tomatoes. Stay tuned over at my place (and I am serious when I say) for forthcoming photos of our little vols. They're delicious.