I've whipped up a basic, text-only tutorial from the transcripts of each video, if that's helpful to the community:
Bonus! Here's a basic Dos & Don'ts from these four videos! ππΌπ€
p.s. The viewing password for all above is OP's username copied w/ the at. π©π½βπ¬π§πΏβπ¬π¨βπ¬
Edit to add; i think i found something very akin to what Iβm looking for. Dynamic accumulators is the new word of the week!
I found some further information in pdf form. Still hoping to find some dense spreadsheet that can come along easier than a booklet tho.
Not vetted or even fully read the links yet just posting if others are curious. https://www.sare.org/wp-content/uploads/Compost-Tea-Manual.pdf
Thank you! By what I saw before I got served an ad I will enjoy this content (on my pc with adblock) I just suck at remembering and confidently executing all the various dos and donts from videos Iβve seen over the ye. Which is why Iβm holding out hope someone compiled the mega spreadsheet of goodness. Maybe thereβs a wiki out there waiting to be found.. too bad searching is impossible.
Unfortunately they're videos, not PDFs, but this might be useful:
Make fertiliser from weeds: https://youtu.be/DKoKC0vGkPo
Using wood ash in your vegetable garden: https://youtu.be/judMZBW9uSI
Make fertiliser from fish scraps: https://youtu.be/6BOGxGv8ZfE
Feeding your plants for free: https://youtu.be/0cUc_FKQq7M
I'm not affiliated with this channel in any way, I just like their presentation style.
I know this doesn't answer the question at all, but I've switched to loose leaf for this reason. Tiny plastic bags aren't good for my pile or my blood stream. Some companies use tiny cloth bags, but I found it annoying to keep up with which company does or doesn't and when they decide to switch and not tell me.
I do a 3 bin system made from recycled pallets. Theyβre 4 foot square each. I try and turn the piles at least every week. Now, food scraps, i keep out and use the Bokashi method in a big bucket. I let it break down in there then throw in my pile when Iβm turning it. I donβt have any issues with rodents. Maybe an occasional Opossum but theyβre going after the bugs. The system you need all depends on how much browns and greens you have available. I have a sizable garden and giving neighbors. Go bigger than you think you need.
Not quite.
The fluid from the worm bin is a potent fertilizer, water it down and use as liquid fertilizer.
Our bin lets us harvest the semi solid slab of worm castings from the bottom, which can be used directly as compost in the garden.
I should note that not all our food waste goes in the worms. E.g. meat waste (that doesn't go in the dog) and onion skins go in our city's food waste bin (or regular bin).
We did have a bokashi fermenting bin for those slightly more pestelent food waste items, but we couldn't quite get the hang of it.
I put nearly everything into it, since they claim the hot temperatures are enough to kill perennial weeds and to process cooked food quickly enough to not attract rodents. The rougher stuff is good since it helps keep some airflow between the base and the vent. I saw one slug in the early days and it was on the lid trying to get out, haven't seen any since then. The 60Β°C temperatures are probably too hot for any pests to want to climb inside and if they did they would turn into compost quite quickly. But it is stupidly expensive, I had it in my basket for about two weeks before deciding to buy it.
Interesting, I'll have a look. They are available in Germany, but even pricier than you mentioned. Do you put rougher garden stuff in there as well? Like poison ivy? I could image the higher temperatures can handle it and also kill the seeds. Do slugs get in?
So you put it in there first and then on the compost when processed?
Are you able to get a hotbin in Germany? I think some garden centres in Ireland will ship them to mainland Europe if they aren't sold directly. They do cost about β¬200-300, but they work very well. I've had one for a few weeks now and once the base layer was established it's been cooking at 50-60Β°C consistently and should produce either a mulch within the next few weeks or compost within 90 days of it being started. There's a carbon filter on it to reduce smells and the whole thing is made of thick polypropylene so it should be fairly rat proof. I keep it in my greenhouse to have an additional barrier from rats and because the steam from the vent is helping a little with keeping frost off my seedlings since there has still been some snow and hail here even in March. The only real downside so far has been the price.
We have a worm farm/bin for food scraps.
It means our compost bin doesn't need to be much more than something to contain the pile of stuff.
Oh, that is interesting. I did not know you could print something so big.
Be careful with the type of plastic though. You do not want anything bad to leak/degrade, because eventually, it will get to our food.
Not yet, but I've been so far doing some reading on it: 1) Worms Eat My Garbage by Mary Appelhof and Joanne Olszweski and 2) Compost City by Rebecca Louie.
I am planning on printing this https://www.printables.com/model/60965-small-fully-printable-modular-vermicomposter soon. Not ordered the filament yet. The 3-box-setup can also fairly easily be constructed in a DIY-fashion from plastic boxes.
And then place it outside on my balcony when outside temperature allows the worms to thrive and by the time we get to Fall / Winter again, I will find some space in my inside storage room. I also have some room within my apartment that I could use, but want to gauge potential smells and escapees first... :)
The microplastics points by both GreyShuck & you are great, I was not even thinking about microplastics & my (& female roommateβs) health, just the issue of not being able to find a way to compost them because plastic in general.
Also awesomely help point about cutting off the tops & dumping the tea into stainless steel tea steeping container, because yes, we do have one.
As GreyShuck said, many (most) teabags use plastic. Not only are these not compostable, they also release upwards of 10 to 20 billion particles of microplastic while steeping in your cup, so best not to use them at all if avoidable (you can cut the tops off the top the bags and dump the contents into a stainless steel tea steeping container to not waste what you already have).
Off the top of my head, I know that Yogi brand teabags do not use plastic in their bags, so those should be compostable.
Good to know
A lot of brands do use bags containing plastic - which probably isn't great in terms of you actually ingesting microplastic as you drink, let alone composting - but some do not. The trick is to find the brands that don't and use them. They fully compost.
Did you start the vermicompost OP? I am thinking about the same, the setup with 3 boxes stacked on top of each other..
Don't throw it away, compost it.
We do wood chip paths and the weedy growth gets chopped up a bit and tossed on the paths. We'll weed like that all season - walking on the paths break everything down further as we go. If the winter is wet and warm we'll use the paths as a fertilizing mulch the following year. If winter is cold and relatively dry we'll use it after another year
You could also use cardboard layed flat. It blocks all the light long enough to kill every weed under it, and then in spring, it either already decayed, or you can pick it up and throw it away.
That is the same way politicians in South Fl. do to look good, by hiring huge corporations, when can easily just create local neighborhoods doIng this themselves & regulate them, all most all cases not as good for The Environment. Newly elected Mayor of one of the counties, I (not the lamestream news challenges that did whole segments, on her plan) contacted pointed the above out & that the monopoly corporation she was talking up used tons of plastic, instead easily recycled metal & huge dump trucks traveling great distances. Since I do not live in Ag. & Unincorporated area/cannot vote for her, no one ever got back to me.
This is the problem with our species, we let those few that have a ton of resources & thus can easily do what must be for the benefit of The Living Planet & All Living Beings, just decide I want something cooler, to them, & never do it. There must be serious costs (rehabilitation & penalties) to those that refuse to do the right thing.
In my privileged family, many households could get solar panels, electric vehicles (both of these things my own parents just will not do) & so much more, yet it is not what they prefer to do, some BS reasoning!
Example is what at least over a decade ago, I remember watching Independent news reports on what South Africa did, when small percentage of their population (large percentage were Caucasian) was consuming too much of the water, South Africa was heading to having no more water! They put a limit on amount of water that could use & gave financial penalties for going over & hired people to travel around give citations!
Now Iran Capital is in the same fate,
Ah yeah. It occured to me afterwards that composting for an apartment or balcony would be a lot different.
I'm not too sure what would be a full batch. It's only been a few years and each year is a little different. What I have noticed is that whatever is growing around those dumping spots tend to grow way more compared to other areas.
For example one dumping spot was surrounded by tomato and cucumber plants. I struggled to keep those plants trimmed and at a reasonable size. I'm assuming the roots of those plants grew in the direction of all that constant, fresh compost.
I'll probably give the top layer of soil a good mixing next spring to spread out the compost. I'm trying to work towards a no till or minimal tilling for my gardens so I'm still experimenting and observing. I'm also trying to find a way to do this all with as few tools or products as possible while keeping it as local as possible.