ANAEROBIC BACTERIA ARE EATING MY KITCHEN WASTE OM NOM NOM
When we first started looking at houses, I intended to buy one of those fancy-pants kitchen composters that do all the work for you, and have built-in activated charcoal filters so you don't have to deal with the smell.
Unfortunately, those cost around three hundred dollars, and you have to plug them in. Our kitchen is not currently arranged in a manner that would allow convenient placing of such a device, and also I would rather spend three hundred dollars on camera equipment.
In my internet travels, I recently discovered the concept of Bokashi composting, and was intrigued. Here was a system that could be used indoors, produced little-to-no odor, and didn't require worms! (The thought of willingly bringing creepy-crawlies into the house gives me palpitations.)
Basically, to do bokashi composting, you just need a bucket, a substrate innoculated with friendly anaerobic bacteria, and stuff for the bacteria to nom, i.e. kitchen scraps. Put the scraps in the bucket, cover with the bacteria-laden substrate, repeat until the bucket is full. Then ignore the bucket for two weeks, then place the resulting pre-compost outside to mature, after which point you can use it in your garden.
I purchased a starter kit on Amazon for less than fifty bucks. It includes a specialized bucket with a false mesh bottom and a spigot for draining off the "compost tea," which is a secondary product of the bacterial process, the Bokashi bran, a scoop, and a tool to compress the kitchen scraps and bran. Since the bacteria are anaerobic, the less air, the better!
The kit arrived on Wednesday, and so far things seem to be going well. My kitchen doesn't smell any different, and I'm really enjoying putting stuff I would normally throw in the garbage into my new bin. (Did I mention that you can put ANYTHING biodegradable, including meat and bones, into the bin? No? YOU CAN TOTALLY DO THAT.)
If all goes well, I intend to purchase a second bucket, so there won't be a gap in our ability to compost while a batch is aging in the bucket.
Now my only problem is how to handle the outdoor aging portion. I was planning on building an outdoor compost bin with fence stakes and chicken wire type stuff, but after looking at the different bins available on Amazon, it might just be cheaper and easier to buy something. There's also the issue of not knowing *exactly* where our property line is, and I wouldn't want to build something that accidentally encroached on the neighbor's yard.
Right now, I'm leaning towards this one or this one. I'm actually thinking the Fiskars one might be a better bet, since it has an open bottom which would allow worms to access the decomposing material and help things along.
At any rate, I have some time to decide, since I'm not going to spend money on anything else until I see if this whole Bokashi business works as well as the reviews I've read say it does.
Unfortunately, those cost around three hundred dollars, and you have to plug them in. Our kitchen is not currently arranged in a manner that would allow convenient placing of such a device, and also I would rather spend three hundred dollars on camera equipment.
In my internet travels, I recently discovered the concept of Bokashi composting, and was intrigued. Here was a system that could be used indoors, produced little-to-no odor, and didn't require worms! (The thought of willingly bringing creepy-crawlies into the house gives me palpitations.)
Basically, to do bokashi composting, you just need a bucket, a substrate innoculated with friendly anaerobic bacteria, and stuff for the bacteria to nom, i.e. kitchen scraps. Put the scraps in the bucket, cover with the bacteria-laden substrate, repeat until the bucket is full. Then ignore the bucket for two weeks, then place the resulting pre-compost outside to mature, after which point you can use it in your garden.
I purchased a starter kit on Amazon for less than fifty bucks. It includes a specialized bucket with a false mesh bottom and a spigot for draining off the "compost tea," which is a secondary product of the bacterial process, the Bokashi bran, a scoop, and a tool to compress the kitchen scraps and bran. Since the bacteria are anaerobic, the less air, the better!
The kit arrived on Wednesday, and so far things seem to be going well. My kitchen doesn't smell any different, and I'm really enjoying putting stuff I would normally throw in the garbage into my new bin. (Did I mention that you can put ANYTHING biodegradable, including meat and bones, into the bin? No? YOU CAN TOTALLY DO THAT.)
If all goes well, I intend to purchase a second bucket, so there won't be a gap in our ability to compost while a batch is aging in the bucket.
Now my only problem is how to handle the outdoor aging portion. I was planning on building an outdoor compost bin with fence stakes and chicken wire type stuff, but after looking at the different bins available on Amazon, it might just be cheaper and easier to buy something. There's also the issue of not knowing *exactly* where our property line is, and I wouldn't want to build something that accidentally encroached on the neighbor's yard.
Right now, I'm leaning towards this one or this one. I'm actually thinking the Fiskars one might be a better bet, since it has an open bottom which would allow worms to access the decomposing material and help things along.
At any rate, I have some time to decide, since I'm not going to spend money on anything else until I see if this whole Bokashi business works as well as the reviews I've read say it does.