Home Composting
Buy A Bin
We offer a range of collection points throughout Lochaber for our compost bins priced at £5 per bin. To find out where your nearest collcetion point is or to reserve a bin for collection please call 01397 700 090 or email zerowaste@lochaber-environmental-group.org.uk.
We also offer a recycling service for unwanted and disused compost bins, so if you have a dormant bin in your garden and we can't convince you to get it back in action we will collect it and give it to a good home.
What to put in compost
Compost needs a good balance of green and brown materials, too much green material can make it too wet and too much brown and it may get too dry.
Green materials:
- uncooked vegetable waste
- tea bags
- grass cuttings
- bracken
- annual weeds
- cut flowers
- egg shells
- dead leaves
- dung
- seaweed
Brown materials:
- cardboard e.g egg boxes, cereal boxes, tea packets. scrunch up lightly to leave air spaces
- Envelopes - ought not to be in the recycling because of the gummed sides, but can happily be scrunched up in your compost
- twigs and branches
It's so easy:
Why not collect your raw vegetable kitchen scraps by having a handy kitchen container. Then when it's full empty the contents into your garden compost bin. Line your caddy with a sheet of newspaper and add your peelings. Keep it from going too slushy by adding your loo roll tubes and scrunched up envelopes or bits of paper/cardboard.
What not to put in compost?
- Cooked food
- raw meat or fish
- bones
- disposable nappies
- tin cans
- plastic of any kind
- pet excrement
Top tips for good compost:
- Position your compost bin on the ground not on paving stones, so that worms can get in
- Keep two compost bins. when the first is nearly full, or at the end of the summer, lift off the lid and fork it all into the second empty bin, this gives the compost a turn, allowing more air in for aerobic digestion. put the lid on and leave till the following spring. start collecting in the second bin.
- Nettles, comfrey and urine give the compost a kick start!
What if I don't have a garden?
No problem! A wormery is ideal for flats, balconies etc. these come supplied as kits with worms and instructions. treat the worms as pets - feed and water daily, and produce beautiful compost for hanging baskets, patio tubs etc. Subsidised cost £99.
Also ideal for kitchen waste is a Bokashi unit. This digestes all cooked and uncooked food including meat and fish. it works by adding a ready prepared bran to the unit that contains a concoction of bacteria that do the digesting.
Click here to read more about Bokashi
