Adventures In Composting

Those of you who have followed this blog for a while will know already that I really love composting. In fact, I've got it down to such a fine art at the allotment that I can now make good compost in about three months which is good going by anyone's standards. As well as our compost bins we have a wormery in the garden for kitchen waste which allows us to get rid of green waste in a useful way closer to home. We also have a larger compost bin in the garden for garden waste. Although our local council does provide a brown bin we try and compost what we can ourselves as this is the most ecologically friendly way of doing it.

One thing we have always struggled with getting rid of though is any left overs that can not be eaten or anything fatty that can not go into the normal compost bin. It is for this reason that we have decided to try our hand at bokashi composting and invested in two bokashi compost bins to do it.

The bokashi concept originated in Japan. It’s accelerated composting using bokashi bran, wheat bran that has been inoculated with effective mirco-organisms (EMs), which act to anaerobically pickle your kitchen waste. There are no odours and the system doesn’t attract flies, so you can safely store your bokashi bin inside the home. And, when transferred to the garden, bokashi compost breaks down incredibly quickly and doesn’t attract vermin.

Apparently, all we need to do is add any plate scrapings, and food waste, including meat, fish and dairy products into our bokashi bin. Then we need to sprinkle over a handful of bokashi bran and fit the air tight lid to let the composting begin. Once full, the material needs to be left to ‘pickle’ for 2 weeks. Then, the contents of the bin can be added to our home compost heap, or mixed into the soil in your garden.

Another bonus of the bokashi bin is the juice that it produces. This rich liquid fertiliser can be drained off every couple of days and diluted with water to give plants a boost, or simply poured straight down the drain to prevent algae build-up and eliminate odours.

We've just got started with our first bokashi bin (we bought two so they can be used in rotation) so I'll keep you posted how we get on. And, if any of you out there have any experience of bokashi composting I'd love to hear your tips for success.

Comments

[Kerry]

Great tips and interesting info
Thank you - back to my garden

[Liz]

Thanks for the tips. It seems to be going well so far. The taps on both bins do leak though.. Has anyone else had a problem with this?

[Simon Wray]

We've had two Bokashi Bins for ~ 2 years now and they seem to work pretty well. Though we don't have a lot of waste food that can't be composted, the bins are handy for the few odds and ends. But it does mean that the bins get plenty of time to pickle.

[Rachael]

Hi - I've been using bokashi for a couple of years now. We now very rarely throw any food away, the only exception being odds and ends of cheese. I have heard the system can only cope with so much dairy. I once got a batch that smelt revoltingly cheesy!
One thing I would say is I'm not sure how true it is that the contents of the bins does not attract vermin. When i first got my bins I started doing trenches with them at the allotment, and I often found that these got dug up by something. Could have been foxes. Also I definitely had a few rats in the compost daleks, but I have remedied this by putting a couple of sheets of sturdy mesh underneath them.
Lastly, be careful with suppliers of bran. I got a very dodgy batch from The Recycle Works - it kept going mouldy before I could use it. But to be fair they did replace it when I complained. I haven't had any problems with Wiggly Wigglers. Good luck - I look forward to hearing how you get on with it.

[Jo]

I'll be interested to see how you get on with this method of composting. It does make sense to be able to compost waste which is usually non compostable.