Homemade compost is so exciting! (MERGED)

cestlavie

hello
have some organic sprouting beans and some miso paste (fermented soya) well past their sell by date. are either suitable for compost pile?
thanks for advice

nodwah

The sprouts will def be ok and i guess the soya will be as well If there's any microorganisms in there they might help break down the rest of the stuff in the heap like in a bokashi maybe

positivelymummy

ate half a bag of pistachios last night (yum) can i put the shells in the compost bin? been trying to look for info for half an hour but have given up! thoughts anyone? thanking you

loumac

Hmmm..... I'd guess that you could. Absolutely no basis for my answer though!

Farway

No reason why not, they are vegeatable / fruit origin after all

However I suspect they may take a while to break down

The only caveat would be if they were salted or spiced in some way

OddjobKIA

the shells should be fine..but beware of the whole nut..as they are transported with the same care as explosives....

pandora205

I put peanut shells in mine and they are fine (which I'd have thought would be similar), although they don't rot as quickly as other stuff. I tend to scrunch them up when I use the compost rather than wait!

Fern_Merkin

Farway wrote: »

No reason why not, they are vegeatable / fruit origin after all

However I suspect they may take a while to break down

The only caveat would be if they were salted or spiced in some way

Wash em then smash with a hammer. Greater surface area then to let the microbes in. Don't think the worms would be interested.

At least if the bits are small and clean it won't matter too much if no creature touches them. They'll add drainage to your final compost

FX

Lotus-eater

If they are the salted kind I would leave them out, otherwise what they said ^

twinklyrach

MoneySavers, I have smelt evil. It's at the bottom of my garden in my compost bin.

The top is fine - not a lot going on there so far - but if I lift my dalek up a bit the smell is vile. It literally smells of evil. Nothing appears to have broken down except into a sludgy goo that makes my eyes water.

I've tried adding browns for all I'm worth but it's just not doing anything. I've tried mixing the heap up to no avail (plus it's rather difficult as I can't reach to the bottom, being not very tall). When I look in the little hatch there's just unrotted stuff plus the aforementioned sludge.

Someone please help! I am so fed up with it - the pile has been going since September 07 and I've not had even a teaspoon of compost out of it. I feel so ashamed; I'm from a dynasty of gardeners/allotmenteers and I cannot get this right. I'm so close to chucking it all away and not bothering anymore, which sucks as I'm desperate to start my veggie patch and also we barely have anything to put out for the fortnightly bin collection these days. But if I just have putrid sludge festering at the bottom of my garden and emanating the stench of death, then what chance do I possibly have of growing vegetables?