Composting in a Small Home and Garden (An Update)
“Landfills continue to be built in disenfranchised communities. Food deserts continue to be prevalent in disenfranchised communities. Climate change continues to be felt the most in disenfranchised communities. Taking ‘sustainable action’ means taking action to create a greener, cleaner world for everyone. Reducing food waste and regenerating soil are two of the best ways to help reverse climate change. Composting does both.” - Compostable LA
HOW WE STARTED OUR COMPOSTING JOURNEY…
More than a year ago, we began our composting experience here at our lil’ cottage in the city in order to divert our organic materials from landfills. (Food waste is one of the largest component within landfills in the US, and it releases potent methane— a greenhouse gas.)
In the kitchen, we use a countertop bin that we fill up throughout the day before routinely pouring it into our 33 gallon Jora Composter tumbler, which sits in our back garden.
We eat a vegetarian diet, composed primarily of plant-based ingredients. Between those scraps and the greenery from our yard, the tumbler filled up quickly. But even in its compact format, it was still large enough to accommodate most of our green output.
When the tumbler needed a little time to break down its contents, we relied a touch more on LA’s “green bins" — the city-issued, outdoor containers reserved for yard clippings, branches, flowers, a variety of grasses, leaves, and fruits + vegetables from any source that have NOT been prepared for consumption and have NOT been partially consumed.
TROUBLESHOOTING
It took Adam a while to strike the right ratio of green vs brown materials in our tumbler. The contents immediately became to moist, as we had more kitchen scraps than brown matter. So Adam relied on weekly supplements of wood shavings to balance out the contents. But the shavings had to be purchased, and were packaged in plastic, which completely counteracted the positive impact we were trying to have. So after using one bag and getting the contents of the tumbler to dry out to a moderate level, Adam replaced the shavings with dried, fallen leaves rounded up from our garden. (He does this every Sunday after he tends to our two Lettuce Grow towers.)
We quickly learned not to toss anything in the tumbler that isn’t truly organic matter. We avoided adding products / materials that claimed to be “backyard compostable, as they can be problematic. (If you’re new to composting and/or want to be an informed consumer, I’d recommend doing some research on “biodegradable” vs “compostable” vs “backyard compostable.”)
At the end of spring / start of summer, we were able to use some of the compost in our lil’ porch garden, and throughout patches of the yard. We did this gradually and carefully, as we weren’t confident that the dogs wouldn’t start sniffing around in the soil and digging everything up. Luckily, that didn’t happen.
COMPOSTING DURING THE PANDEMIC
Since Sheltering at Home for over 4 months and preparing nearly every meal here during that time, the scraps became too much for the tumbler.
We explored options for a residential compost pickup service, and discovered that our home is located within Compostable LA’s service area, so we enrolled ourselves (along with our next door neighbor) in their services as a way of managing the overflow of scraps from the tumbler.
Here’s a list of what can and can’t go in a Compostable bin:
The service starts when Compostable drops off a clean bakery bucket to live out its new life as a short-term residential compost storage bin. Once a week, Compostable delivers / exchanges the buckets, and transports the food scraps to their nonprofit partner, LA Compost. Compost is used in members’ gardens and sold to urban farmers.
This is one way in which we’re putting our consumer activism to work.
*Source: The NDRC
Select photos by Lucia Doynel
To donate a box of organic fruits and vegetables to Angelenos within food deserts, click here to buy a box for $32 + delivery to be gifted and delivered by the non-profit Suprmarkt. (Please explore the drop-down menu and sidebar options for full customization and pricing.)
