Believe it or not newspaper is exponentially better than leaves for adding carbon. Cardboard is great as well. Junk mail has a fitting end in the compost pile. Just remove any of those plastic windows on some envelopes. Paper grocery bags. Even old clothing provided it is made from natural fibers like cotton and not nylon or other synthetics that don't break down. Old t shirts, jeans etc.

Get creative and I bet you can find lots of things laying around the house that you would otherwise toss in the trash that will help raise the brown content of your pile.

I KNEW I was buying organic cotton clothing for a reason! :D I have the same problem... not many browns... a lot of spent flowers, but no browns.... I don't subscribe to the newspaper, so I will have to buy one...

Don't buy them, talk to your local library about getting theres when they are done with them. Otherwise talk to the local newspaper about your plans to recycle those extras in an enviromentally beneficial way.

If you are willing to do the shredding work talk to local businesses about papers, boxes and the like.

When at the store and there are flyers being handed out, take a bunch and make the person handing them out happy ;-0

Restaurants are another place for materials.

If you work in an office that shreds papers grab those bags full of carbon. Many offices also have newspaper subscriptions and they get tossed daily.

Just call around or better go visit and ask. All it really takes to get a home composting operation into high gear is a single outlet willing to set aside what you need for regular pickups.

Otherwise you face the inevitable; too many greens spring and summer and too many browns in fall. Not a big deal for cold composters willing to take their time, but if you want to kick things up a notch then a bit of scavenging is in order ;-)

I have been wondering about the newspaper thing-- if they are partly from recycled papers, are we sure there aren't metals and chemicals that are dangerous? I wonder if there are any studies about this.
thanks.

If you generate mostly a little kitchen waste- you may consider a worm bin. Digests mostly greens.

The newspaper recycling dumpsters seem to have bags of already shredded papers in them. I would dump my newspapers in and remove the already shredded stuff. An even trade I would say.

But I much prefer shredded leaves for browns over paper, which I have always thought of as empty calories. The neighborhood provides 200-400 bags of leaves each fall for my shredder.

I'd listen to pablo_nh and set yourself up with a worm bin (vermicomposting). It's better and worms also eat crushed egg shells, breads & cereals, pasta, and human/animal hair. It's faster than normal composting, produces a better end product, and easier.

Regular compost "recycles" nutrients you already have, but worm bins "create" nutrients as the food and bedding goes through a physical and chemical change in the worms bodies. The castings from worms are the best organic fertilizer known to mankind, it doesn't burn, ph perfect, odor free, breaks up clay soils and binds sandy soil, encourages growth in plants, and loaded with beneficial bacteria. There are organic fertilizers out there that have higher N-P-K values than worm castings, but don't improve your soil structure and life in your soil while at the same time fertilizing as well as castings.

I have a couple worm bins along with my regular composting bins and I wish I could make it all worm bins. I find regular composting more work, and resulting product inferior. But, regular composting is good for composting things worms can't handle (wood chips), and you can make huge quantities of end product with regular composting whereas worm bins you can't. Worms are veracious eaters and never sleep (make sure you purchase or find the right kind as there's only certain species of worms that will thrive in bins). I started feeding mine 5 lbs/week in kitchen scraps, then started collecting the coffee grounds & filters at work each day and to a point I'm feeding them 10-14 lbs of scraps a week. They're eating 20-28 lbs/week (half scraps/half bedding) giving me 100+ lbs of organic fertilizer a month even in winter. Good thing it doesn't burn! The worm castings (finished product) needs to be mixed or top dressed with soil because it is a sort of slow release organic fertilizer.

I'd switch to worm composting for your kitchen scraps, it's easier and produces a better end product and I personally leave the regular composting to the grass clippings, weeds, leaves, wood chips, and I urinate on it for added trace elements.

To clarify I urinate on my regular compost to add trace elements, I don't urinate in my worm bins. I don't think the worms would like me urinating on them much.

Shredded junk mail and old bills, etc make a great and always available source of browns for my pile.

I save the newspaper for mulching the pathways.

Get a couple of bales of straw. Shred it, and it breaks down great. Urine helps keep it hot and breaks it down faster even with all your kitchen scraps. I run a restaurant and had the same problem you did. I also use cardboard and paper too. Good Luck RD

Piedmont- this worm thing sort of intrigues me. Do you have the special (expensive) bins or would a big Rubbermaid thing work? They mustn't freeze in the winter, right? What are the oxygen and drainage requirements? Is it a lot of work?
My husband may think I've really lost it if I tell him we are raising worms!
Thanks!

Most folks keep the bins indoors it seems. There's a book called "Worms Eat My Garbage" that seems to be the bible for this, and there's a Vermicomposting forum here.

I'm not sure this will even post it's so long. Worm bins can be a lot of things except cedar or redwood. The best are old wooden drawers from furniture people have thrown out, the wood helps absorb excess moisture and they're the perfect shape, you want short and wide. They only last 3-5 years though as worm bins. Plastic storage containers work also, you may need a couple. The commercial "Worm Bins" are overkill in my opinion.

I purchased several plastic storage containers from K-Mart with covers for $4.99 each. I came across this site http://www.mtlebanonlibrary.org/worms.html and they converted over the same container I did to a worm bin, I have several right now. They must've started with very few worms, my worms are eating 20-28 lbs a week and would be done that bin in well under a month. I drilled holes into the cover, and around the sides at the top, and some drainage holes on the bottom. The holes can be pretty large, even if they can fit and escape it's rare to see one try. The holes on the bottom I kept too small for them to fit, just in case.

Go to this site afterward to see exactly how to set up the bedding. It's excellent, click on "slide show". http://homepage.mac.com/cityfarmer/PhotoAlbum23.html

Here's the stuff that's hard to come by. Weigh your shredded paper and cardboard before moistening for the bedding. You want to add 3lbs of water for ever lb of bedding if your bin is wood, or 2 1/2 lbs of water per lb of bedding if plastic. As mentioned, although leaves are "natural" they're not as good as paper or card board for bedding.

No shiny paper (such as magazines or some ads). It may contain synthetic fibers, may be coated in wax, or coated in varnish to make it shiny.

Worms only eat in the surface 6-12". You don't want a deep bedding because they won't touch it instead it will compact, turn anearobic and cause problems.

Worms have no eyes, but have a light sensor and hate light. Your bin should be in a dark place, and not see-through. You want either wood, or an opaque plastic container, or your bin in a dark location.

They live between 40-80F and why the bin should be indoors, preferably the basement. I've killed a couple bins entirely by having them outside on a perfect day, only to have it unexpectedly turn for the worse and scorch them to death. I never succeeded with the outdoor thing. There is no odor or noise, I wanted to keep my bins under the kitchen sink but wife wouldn't have it.

Worms have 5 hearts.

Worms never sleep.

Worms have both sex organs but can't self breed.

Worms don't have teeth, they use crushed egg shells or dirt/sand to grind the food in their gizzard. That's why they need a handful of sand, dirt, or crushed egg shells to be included in the bin.

The more varied their diet, the more varied their castings.

Wash banana peels before cutting and placing in the bin as they may contain pesticides.

If you're adding banana & citrus peels make sure you add crushed egg shells periodically as well. The occasional peel & citrus is fine, but too many will turn your bin acid. Crushed egg shells neutralize, and beneficial for trace elements and worms use them to help digest food. I put my spent egg shells in the sun for a couple days to dry out, then place them in a sandwhich bag and roll it with a roller until it's a powder, then sprinkle it on the next food batch I'm going to add. Lime can do the same thing, but make sure it's powdered natural lime and not hydrated, hydrated lime will kill. Eggshells fit the theme better.

Worms breath through their skin, and must be kept moist for it to exchange gases. That also means you have to keep your bin aerobic else worms will suffocate.

The bedding should be moist but not wet, similar to compost. Taking a hand full of bedding and squeezing it as hard as you can, you should be able to wring out a 2-3 drops of water. More than 5 drops and it's too wet.

You shouldn't need to add water once set up, the food you add will replenish what's been wasted. But, you should check it once a week. Bedding that's too wet, the worms will try to escape the bedding.

There are several types of worms that can work in a worm bin, the species best suited is the red worm Eisenia foetida. I purchased mine from http://www.gardeners.com/Red-Wiggler-Worms/default/02-232.prd and ended up getting a couple other types mixed in. Not a bad thing, the type that does best is the type that will flourish. You may find red worms for free in old compost, or old manure piles that have already composted and cooled down.

Earth Movers like the night crawlers die in worm bins, they live in burrows, hate having their burrows disturbed, can't live in the same temperature range, and try to flee everytime you add food in the bin.

Worms eat decomposing matter. Placing fresh food in, the worms won't be able to eat it until it probably some weeks later when it's decomposing.

While collecting kitchen scraps, place it in the bin twice a week if possible. Keep the container open, it won't turn anaerobic, shouldn't smell (if it does then place it in the bin rather than waiting) plus you don't want to encourage anaerobic bacteria in the bin.

The higher the temperature the faster the worms work. The E. Fetida worms at around 70-75F is where they're working fastest. Above 80F is dangerous and above 90F or below 40F they start to die.

Worms can last several weeks without being fed so no worries going on vacation. If longer than three and you want to maintain a high worm population best to get someone to feed your worms.

Blending the food before adding will shorten the time it's eaten but I think using an electric device and having to use fossil fuels for the electricity or hot water to clean it afterward sort of defeats the environmental goodness of why the worm bin. I use a dirty knife to cut the pieces into smaller portions or just stick them in whole. You should also pierce the skins of any grapes/cherries you add.

You can't add an unusually high amount of kitchen scraps suddenly. It's okay to add 3 lbs one week and 6 lbs the next but you can't put the 20 lbs of scraps from making a thanksgiving dinner into a bin that's used to 5 lbs/week. Put in a little more than usual into the bin, and the rest into your normal compost.

That's a summary of what I've learned. There's an excellent book "Worms eat my garbage" by Mary Applehof that's probably in every library across the country and very easy reading. I highly recommend it. It's really easy, once you've got the holes drilled in the bin, bedding set up and worms added, generally for the next 4-6 months it's just move some bedding to the side noticing how moist it is, plop in the kitchen scraps, put the bedding so it covers it completely, and come back in 3 days and repeat in a different spot of your bin.

Piedmont, I cannot thank you enough for the great info on the worms. I have printed it out and will look into it more, run it by my hubby after I have made him his favorite food. my kids will love it.
So, all of your scraps don't go to the worms, just some of them? Otherwise you'd be feeding them too often? (Assuming just one bin.)
I will look for this book today when I go to the library.
Thank you again!

It sounds like I didn't explain myself with the amount of kitchen scraps. All my kitchen scraps go into my worm bins. The problem arises when I invite 20 people over for dinner and afterward they create 25 lbs of kitchen scraps. That won't fit in my worm bins, and if it did I don't have the worm population to handle that much from a single course. So, what does one do on the occasions they invite 25 people for dinner and create huge amounts of scraps from one meal.

There's several things, I can freeze the extra, and spread it to my worms over the weeks and has the benefit freezing breaks the cell molecules increasing decay rate. Or, I can create a seperate worm bin bucket whose purpose is to dump huge amounts of kitchen scraps to handle the occasions I invite people over for dinner and not feed the worms in that bucket any other time, while I keep on the normal route of feeding my normal worm bin twice weekly. Or, I can throw the extra scraps in my normal compost bin.

The second point is your worm population adjusts to how many scraps you put in there, it takes about 3 months for the worms to go from their egg pouch (anywhere from 1-4 babies in each) to breeding age, and worms can live for 4 years or more but most last about one. You'll notice the effect of their population increasing after several months trust me.

The surface area of the container determines how many lbs of kitchen scraps a particular bin can process. Pretty much, every square foot of surface area gives you 1 lb more of kitchen scraps it can handle/week. I find though, if you're producing a lot of kitchen scraps (over 5 lbs/week) it's best to split into several smaller bins instead of one large. If you do something like make the bedding too moist there's more work to fix that in one big worm bin. Having a few smaller ones instead it's manageable and only one would be affected. Also, if you're feeding 10 lbs of scraps to your worms in one big worm bin, over 4-6 months just the worm castings & bedding will weigh in the ballpark of 200-400 lbs. Hope you don't have to move it. Splitting it up into two worm bins and feeding each 5 lbs a week, in 4-6 months you'll end up with 2 worm bins each weighing in the ballpark of 100-200 lbs. That's heavy, but at least manageable.

Save your kitchen scraps for a week and weigh them afterward. How much they weigh determines how large, or how many bins you need.

Worms can eat half finished compost as well. Send stuff through one heat cycle if you're not sure about it, and I'll guess that about anything would be safe for worms at that point.

Course I'm a beginner.