Bokashi Bran Compost

[JennieAtkinson]

I got another bucket from work again today. The last one I put in the polytunnel ready for my courgettes, but I dug this one into the outside area. Aimee, my delightful young puppy, has been digging it up all day ! The lawn is strewn with bits of banana, oranges and T bags (that's all the office seem to eat).

Anyone know whether it can harm dogs ? She seems ok. Might do the lawn good though

[eskymo]

Does it harm worms? My compost bin is full of worms [of the wormery varierty - they migrated with some extra worm compost I had and obviously multiplied] - it's great to have them in there as they munch away at everything, but I've ben adding the contents of my bokashi bin and wondered whether that might harm the worms? any thoughts?

[goddess]

can you please explain what bokashi bran compost is?

[eskymo]

Here's a link to the Wiggly Wigglers site that explains what it is:

Bokashi

[Alison]

According to the Wiggly Wigglers site you can add the completed bokasi bins to your compost heap and it improves your overall compost. Have been thinking about getting one of these for a bit so that I can also compost meat scraps etc. I'm a bit put off by the thought that they might smell a bit and cos you have to keep adding the bran. Anybody know re the smell issue and also how long the bran lasts - don't want to have to spend a fortune on it every month.

[eskymo]

You can buy a 6 month supply and only pay for p&p once which is a bonus - they then send you out a bag every two months. I wouldn't wate your money on their expensive bins though as you can make your own - there's a link to the plastic bins I bought on this thread...

Rice/Pasta

[eskymo]

You buy bokashi bins and the bran at a reduced price from this site:

http://www.recyclenow.com

it's cheaper than Wiggly Wigglers!

[jules07]

In my experience bokashi actualy stops kitchen waste from smelling - I don't use the proper bokashi system but have a plastic box with a lid that I collect kitchen waste in for my wormery. Adding a layer of bokashi bram to this every now and then stops it from smelling, though admittedly it would probably be more sensible not to keep forgetting to empty it! It hasn't killed the worms yet - in my experience they're a lot tougher than you expect. They've survived mountains of potato peeling and coloured cardboard before we found out that you weren't meant to put them in and 3 weeks neglect over Christmas

[eskymo]

oooh - I didn't know that you're not to add cardboard and potato peelings to the worm bin - why is that? I give my worms a bit of everything about from orange/lemon/lime peel.

[Sue]

Eskymo
Perhaps it's the coloured cardboard that's a no-no as Jules suggests, I've been putting in plain cardboard, ie loo rolls inners torn up. Never heard about not giving them potato peelings either, though it was just onions and citrus that were out.
Sue

[Alison]

Cardboard is a good thing to put into wormeries but don't use the plastic coated stuff, stops it all getting too wet. Potato peelings are fine also but can be a problem in proper compost bins. Even some citrus / onions is OK so long as you don't over do it and combat the acid with lime.

[jules07]

oooh - I didn't know that you're not to add cardboard and potato peelings to the worm bin - why is that? I give my worms a bit of everything about from orange/lemon/lime peel.

Yes it's just coloured printed cardboard (like cereal packets) you're not meant to add - some of the dyes can apparently be toxic. Having said that it didn't seem to hurt my worms, but when I emptied the compost out it hadn'y broken down, you could still read most of the writing.

I read (but I can't remember where) that raw potato was toxic to worms - isn't this true?

[Alison]

Had not read that anywhere and regularly give mine spud peelings (but not whole spuds) and they seem OK, once you've got them settled they seem pretty resilient to most things in my experience. I have read somewhere that they particularly like cooked potato and I know somebody who always microwaves peelings before putting them in but I think that is more to do with stopping any potential for sprouting.

[Matt.]

I've just taken delivery of my Bokashi bins so rather than start a new thread I've dug out this old one. How much bread can you add to the bin? It seems you can add pretty much anything but what about relative quantities?

Also do you always chop up waste so it has more surface area. Waste like melon rind, grapefruit rind or banana skins for example?

[eskymo]

I chop everything up that goes into the bokashi bin and can highly recommend doing this as My compost bin seems to be producing good qulaity compost in a matter of months since I started using the bokashi bran. I think smaller pieces of waste get broken down faster and so it just depends on how quickly you need your compost as to whether to put the time and effort in to chop everything up.

I find it's best to chop stuff up for the worm bin too and I'm trying adding bokashi to the stuff I put in the worm bin as weel to see if it helps to reduce any smell and therefore see if the amount of flies attracted to the bin is reduced. I don't get a lot of flies, so it's not really a problem, but it would be great to get none.