Composting

Composting man Using a composter means that you can help stop thousands of tonnes of kitchen and garden waste going to landfill and turn it into useful FREE soil conditioner for your own garden instead.

Composters and water butts are available online at reduced prices for Gedling Borough residents. You can visit the Get Composting website for further information.

Did you know?

Organic waste sent to landfill is unable to decompose properly and produces methane, a powerful greenhouse gas, which contributes to global warming.
At least 30% of your household bin could be composted.

How to Compost

Site the composter either directly on the soil or on hard standing such as bricks, paving slabs or concrete and then start putting the compostable items listed below in it. The composter will work quickest when it is in full sun and if you turn the contents periodically with a garden fork, however this is not essential.

You can put many natural things into a composter, including the following:

Greens	Browns
Tea bags	Egg shells (crushed to speed up composting)
Grass cuttings	Egg boxes
Garden prunings	Cereal boxes
Vegetable peelings	Paper (shredded or cut up)
Old flowers, weeds and leaves	Toilet and kitchen roll
Fruit scraps	Wool
Coffee grounds and filter paper	Feathers
Pond algae and seaweed	Straw and hay

Do not put cooked food, dairy, fish or meat in your composter as it may attract vermin.

Kitchen caddies

These make it easier to store and transport your kitchen waste to your composter and are available at a reduced rate from the Get Composting website and as well as other online stores. Alternatively, you could use an old ice cream tub or any pot with a lid to store your kitchen waste in until you take it to the composter.

Cooked Food Composters

You can compost kitchen waste, including cooked food, dairy, fish, meat and small bones, in a food digester such as a wormery or bokashi system. Other types of food digesters, such as a Green Cone, will use heat and harmless bacteria in the soil to break down food waste into its natural components of carbon and water and produce no compost at the other end.

Reduced priced cooked food composters and further information are available online for Gedling Borough residents via the Get Composting website.