What puts you off?

[Speed Gardener]

I have an assortment of bins at home (3 daleks) and down at the plots (four pallet bins, four daleks, three of the 660 litre big square daleks and four leaf bins). I never turn any of them, just skim off all the unrotted stuff, dig out the compost and then put the new stuff back in every spring. I also have a huuuge weed pile that I dig out every other year and two water-filled blue barrels I put bind weed in to rot before burying it in a big trench.
You can never have too much compost!!

[frogdoctor]

Oh Yes..lovely compost

I have two composting systems going on down my allotment plot, The first system being 5 recycle bins (daleks) which I fill with kitchen and allotment waste, when I empty one bin, I empty another into it to turn the contents, so over the year all bins either get turned a few times or emptied.

The second composting system is of four caged raised beds, each about 3 feet high and about 4 feet across, which I fill with only good quality grass cuttings, mowed leaves and manure, when full I cover with some sieved soil, I use these raised beds (hot beds) for growing my soft vegetables (marrows, courgettes etc) once the vegetables have finished growing and have died back I transfer the compost onto my plot, its lovely stuff too

I try to include 4 main ingredients when making my compost...
Green waste..
Brown waste..
Moisture
Air..
If it`s too dry I add moisture and or green waste, If it`s too wet I add air and or brown waste.
Sorry I do go on....

[frogga]

We have 2 compost heaps, one for grass clippings only, and one for all other garden waste and veg peelings. I try and turn themover every 3 months to allow them to rot down well, however have recently noticed that one has become a haven for frogs to live in!

[Two_Sheds]

We have 2 compost heaps, one for grass clippings only

How do you find that works? Does it work? I inherited 2 daleks full of black sludge (grass clippings). It took me 18 months of mixing with newspaper and turning until I was able to use it as compost

[snakeshack]

I found that the 2 dalek syle bins worked ok in a sunny location but are way too small,especially when cleaning out the chickens so I now use the large cubic meter builders bags that they deliver sand and ballast in.they hold enough to heat up quickly for good composting and are easy to empty by rolling the sides down,you can fold them up and put them in the shed or use as temporary covers when not needed and best of all........FREE and available at a local stockist nationwide (skip)

[Mikey]

I have a compost heap that moves every year, I select a strip of my plot and put all my weeds and plant material on top of it, I cover it with the grass clipping from my borders and plant cash crops in it like radish and salads. When we get to the end of the year the remains are turned into a trench for my beans the following year and the ground it was sat on produces the most healthy plants.

[Lavenderblue]

we have loads of composting bins. Loads - at least 8 large bins and a palate one. We put everything we can on there, chopped up into small bits to aid the process. My SIL has 2 guinea pigs so all their poo and bedding goes on which makes excellent compost. In order to get the process going my OH wees on it. I am sorry if that grosses you out but it really has helped get things going. We do have a rat issue on the allotment but we put our bins on fine mesh chicken wire and it seems to keep ratus ratus at bay.

Its rare we throw away cooked kitchen scraps so we don't have a digester bin thing.

[solway cropper]

I have 2 daleks, one open heap, one leaf-mould heap and numerous black bags filled with decomposing stuff. I do add a scoop of chicken manure pellets every now and then and find this helps to speed things up. Seaweed is also a major ingredient and the fact that I got 11lbs of blackcurrants from one bush and lots of 1lb onions is testament to the fact that something is working.

[Bountyhunter]

I have had my Dalek for a few years now, What idiot designed it?

The neck is not wide enough to turn the mix and the hole at the bottom does not allow you to get the stuff out, very frustrating.

I mostly use mine for kitchen waste and occasionally when there is not much grass clippings they go in. I seem to put a lot of bread in mine. What worries me is when the waste leaves a powdery mold. I wonder if this could be bad if breathed in.

Sometimes when i take my lid off its full of worms so i know its working ok. Mine is in the hottest part of the garden, its working but a pain to turn it. It very rarely smells and is just an earthy smell when i mix it...with mold spores flying into my lungs.

[Two_Sheds]

I have had my Dalek for a few years now, What idiot designed it? ... its working but a pain to turn it.

Agreed.
The trick is to take the whole thing up and off, resite and refill it.

[zazen999]

Nothing puts me off.

i have a 2 pallet size compost bin at the lottie; and a heap at the other end, and save bags of leaves and pernicious weeds for 2 years to use as topping when it is broken down enough.

i have a big hand made bin at home, plus a dalek, plus 3 dustbins which all get filled up for their first 'breaking down' time, and piled into the big bin for their last breaking down time.

I also have a wormery [the latest addition] which I feed with scraps at the moment until they multiply and speed up the process.....the worm wee gets used as feed for the toms and peppers and already is making a difference.

i also make short term compost areas at the lottie, dotted round where I have additional space, where autumn trimmings are put over the winter, which are then spread over the surface come spring and dug in - anything remaining green after that is raked out and put on the normal heap.

My motto is, if you can't fill the space with crops, then at least fill it with ex-crops so that the goodness stays on or in the soil. Plus it saves lugging compost round the plot all the time.

[lbt]

I love my wormery - it's been going for nearly a year now and the compost is almost ready - it smells fantastic. It's great because you can add cooked veg scraps amongst other things that aren't usually recommended for a compost heap.

I have just taken over an allotment so I have only just started my compost heap but between my worms, rabbits and compost heap virtually nothing is wasted I even use my rabbit waste on the compost heap to speed it up - I currently have them cutting the grass for me too

[Sara]

Thanks for your comments, everyone. We've squeezed as many of them as we can into the October issue.