You can start a compost pile in many ways. If you already have a box that you want to use, thats fine. You'll want air to access all sides of your compost pile easily. The little micro organisms need to breath. You'll also want to watch it, and water it when needed. It doesn't need to be soaking wet, but damp enough to feel like a wet sponge.

Greens are mainly your food waste, or even grass clippings. Browns are things like leaves, paper, saw dust, and straw. You'll need more browns than greens. The greens help turn the browns into compost, but having too much greens, means the lose of nitrogens. Some people will turn the pile every few weeks, others hardly at all. Turning it helps speed it up, but can disturb the process causing a lose in nutrients.

Oh and you don't need a box. My compost bin is just some stakes with fencing around it. Some use cinder blocks, while others build bins using palot boards, the most simple bin is just a pile someplace.

Getting started is really easy, just pile up some plant residue, food waste, anything that once grew and it will get digested. However, there are things you can do that will help your compost get digested better with less of a chance for obnoxious odors to happen, and having unwanted guests messing around with your compost pile. The lonk below will take you to a very good tutorial on composting.

Here is a link that might be useful: Florida Composting Online

Find lots of fall leaves while you still can.

Being new to composting, I find this thread quite interesting, and I have a couple questions to add. I have been researching/searching and reading many of these threads going back as far as my eyes held out. But, I still need a bit of clarification. I keep coming across terms like "food waste", "kitchen waste". Just exactly what is kitchen/food waste? Does this include leftover meals that have outlived their refrigerator lifespan or appeal? How about gravy, mashed potatoes, things with sauces? Stew, soups, chicken curry? Leftover stuffing? Methinks maybe these items are better suited for the worm bin (which I have a small one -15 gal- I recently started), but am not sure what is acceptable for the compost bin itself.

Santa brought my wife a 150 gallon "Super Composter Bin" from WalMart this year, so we (I) are/am busy filling up and I'm constantly getting grief about what I put in there. I have a couple bags of shredded leaves in there with another couple to add as needed, plus a stack of newspapers that grows on a daily basis. I also have a small greenhouse full of plants and am constantly picking weeds out of the pots, as well as my yard. Instead of going curbside for pickup, these are now going into the bin. But, I would like to be sure what is best to put/not put into which bin. Thanks.

Read

1) The FAQ short articles in this forum
2) Use the 'Search' feature to look up previous threads on question you have

"Kitchen waste" and "food waste" are terms that generally apply to food that is not eaten but will get tossed out and that can be composted. Whether to compost items that are high fat, gravies, meat, butter, etc. depends. With a small composter, the size you are talking about it probably is not a good idea, but someone with larger volumes could easily compost some of that type material.

I started as a newbie composter about 1-2 yrs ago (in a small bin, not a pile). And, I experimented - sometimes I specifically layered very small pieces, sometimes I just threw in whatever was around, sometimes I stirred alot, sometimes I didn't stir for weeks. It was fun experimenting, and then you just end up doing what serves you best at that time.

I don't think that my pile is at all big enough to sufficiently kill the "bad stuff" (a very technical term that I'm sure others here can more eruditely define for you) that is associated with composting meats & fish. Also, I believe that fatty foods don't do good things to composting attempts.

So, I made a list of over 200 things to compost, and the list doesn't include any meats/fish/fats.

Hope this helps,
Tree

PS Just thought I'd peruse my favorite forum after taking a l-o-n-g hiatus for other projects :) (& to be more productive!) I forgot how much I missed all the personalities here! Plus, my small bin freezes up pretty quickly in the winter, so I've decided not to add to it during the winter, which takes my attention off of this topic. :(

Here is a link that might be useful: List of Over 200 Compost Ingredients

FWIW - I simply set aside a section of my vegetable garden each year as the compost heap. Lawn clippings, leaves, kitchen scraps, and eventually whatever grew in the garden that year all end up in the pile. About a month before I plant I then dig what's left into the soil in that section and decide what area will serve as next year's pile. It has been working great for years now.

did santa give you any info on the Super Composter Bin? I mostly use hardware cloth to corral my piles, but your post made me curious.

Hey staticx - yes you can just start to throw greens and browns and yellows into the box. As you go along you'll find what works best for you. Keep asking questions as you get them. Some of us don't mind answering if we know the answer, and usually someone does.

Reading the FAQ and other posts can make for a good read but sometimes it's also confusing. Don't mind Robertz, he's just rude...I mean cranky. Santa couldn't find his house this year.

Val