I've never used a tumbler, but I think you can do it either way. Myself, I would remove the divider and add my kitchen scraps as they appear, adding browns after each addition. You might need to store browns when using a tumbler, but they're not unpleasant to store at least. If I were a beginning composter, I'd want to get on with it, not have to gather ingredients until I had enough to build a full batch. Plus, it will probably become something you do as a way to manage your kitchen---not just for making compost. Toward that end, do you want to add an intermediary waste management problem to your household? If you do decide to go with single batch, it's probably easiest to freeze your contributions in the meantime.

I just want to add compost to flower beds to improve soil. Also how long can the stuff be stored in the tumbler .

I suggest you spend time reading old threads to find your answer because instead of 8-10 people in this thread giving you 4 or 5 different answers,you will see dozens giving the same 4 or 5 answers.

I'm in the camp that say's add it as you have it and let nature do the rest. If you did freeze kitchen scraps and store leaves until you can fully load your tumbler,you would have about one five gallon bucket of finished compost when finished. Here's what has worked for me is a 3'x3'x3' bin with an opening at bottom that alow's removing material from bottom of bin using a fork or spade. I add material to bin as it become's available. Occasionally I pull material from bottom and throw it on top. Decomposition is fairly rapid and reduce's material volume to 50-60% of origional rather quickly then slow's due to compactness and lack of airation. I pull partly composted material from bottom to fill my 55 gallon tumbler. I don't add much if any brown to tumbler but occasionally add water,high moisture fruit/veggis and poultry manure. Starting with 50 gallons of 50% rotted material yield's about 10 gallons of finished compost. I don't strive to cause high heat because I often seed material with worms. This material is used for pot plants,seed trays and other times I need fine compost. I have a large yard with 3 bin system producing larger volume for beds and garden.

Regardless how you produce compost, i think it's important to understand there is 2 destently different procees that make compost. (1) Anaerobic ( slower,bad odor,no heat,alow's seed to remain viable and best used as mulch or fed to an aerobic process as i did above) (2) Aerobic ( faster,produce's heat,reduce's number of seed that remain viable,pleasant earthy odor and suitable anywhere requiring compost.)

Select a method that fit's your life style and is injoyable.

That’s true about apostrophes. (Lol, floral)

I add kitchen scraps almost each day. If the bin is getting too wet or smelly, I add dry leaves or shredded newspaper.

When I lived in the city (Washington DC) I had two large tumblers going to produce compost for my community garden plot. It was really the only option for composting in a city overrun by rats. What I learned is that there is a rhythm to the process that most people don't realize. It's not as easy as throwing your vegetable scraps in the bin with some wood shavings or straw, turning a crank, and then getting wonderful potent compost in a couple of months.

A tumbler gives you a way to process kitchen waste (added with brown material, as you know), and keep the raw material out of the grubby paws of rats and raccoons and the like. However, unless you have something like the big $500 or $900 Joraform insulated tumblers, you probably have something on the smaller side and made out of plastic. (And yes, if you can turn it in to one large unit that would probably be better.)

In about three months, you can turn the raw materials into broken down brown material - not quite compost, but not potato peelings and scrap lettuce either. At that point it needs another 5 to 6 months to break down into crumbly compost. What I suggest, to maximize the use of the tumbler, is to empty the tumbler at the 3 month point and let the compost finish in a pile or in a bin. At that point it is of little interest to rats and other animals, so the tumbler has earned it's keep, even if it doesn't take it all the way to finished compost.

The key thing to take away from this is, if it is ready to come out in three months, when do you start the clock ticking? The answer is the moment you close the door after adding the last load of raw material. It can only go as fast as the last item you threw in there.

I don't really see any reason to wait and fill it up all at once, though. That waste has to go somewhere, it might as well go in the tumbler.

This has timing implications. We have already identified two time factors - three months to process in the composter and then five months to finish in the bin. The other time factor is how long will it take you to fill up the tumbler with raw material? A month? Two months?

Here is the next implication: once you have filled your tumbler, it is now unavailable to you to add scraps for three months while it "cooks". So, as far as processing waste, you will have a month of adding material, and then three months of not adding material. What do you do with your scraps for the three months the composter is working? You can freeze them, toss them in the waste basket, or buy another tumbler to take on material while the first one is unavailable.

Serious composters will have multiple tumblers so one is always being filled while two or more are working.

I think you can see where this is going. The casual composter often begins with a vison that they will toss in scraps every night and then, voilà! Three months later they are adding compost to their garden. It's not as simple as that because of the time involved and the relatively small quantities of waste you are working with. Because the raw materials are trickling in, you have to wait to fill up the bin before you can even start the composting process. And because the composter is small (again, unless you are going to invest in one of the big tumblers and you have the large amount of waste needed to fill it quickly), you can't get things that hot and fast. The $900 Joraform is big enough to hot compost (even in the winter) and can process in half the time a smaller tumbler can. But - it has to be full.

Probably the better option for the casual composter is a closed bin that is open to the ground, but somewhat protected from animals. In that system you simply toss in your waste and brown material as you produce it. Eight or nine months later, you open the bin and dig out just the bottom layer - that stuff is finished. You then leave the top to keep processing as you throw more stuff on the top. Those bins are not very expensive - probably about the same cost your tumbler. Many towns in the UK give them out for free to encourage people to compost.

That wasn't an option for me because rats can easily dig underground and get inside. It was a tumbler or nothing.

Thanks for all the information. I think I understand it a lot better now. I took out the diivider so that there is more room. Once I make sure I can get this thing going I most likely will get another.

Is there a reason you need to have tumblers? It‘s actually much easier to make compost in a simple bin than in a tumbler .... and a lot cheaper! The plastic bins Richard Brennan refers to are far, far cheaper than a tumbler. Old pallets are even cheaper. I have both and prefer the pallets.

I was going to ask the same thing. Do you have room for a pile? I like to turn my compost, so I use hardware cloth bins, which are easy to lift up and off.

My understanding was tumblers preferred to prevent vermin raids and there's no apostle pee available for bins.

Apostle pee? Did I miss something?

To the OP, re: a second composter, you are ahead of the game now that you've realized that. Note that once partially cured in a tumbler, even food waste will have nothing that critters want. You could, if you wanted, use a cheaper option such as a cylinder of chicken wire or hardware cloth, or any type of bin, to transfer the material into from the tumbler. Then start a new batch in the tumbler. Food waste is always in the tumbler so any varmint problems are avoided.

I actually thought about a bin but I would have a place for it other than right in the middle of yard. The tumble fits in small space next to shed. If I were to put a bun there it would be up against it which would be a pain to turn. I had another question if someone could help. I have started layering the tumbler with material, should I be moistening and turning it now or wait until its full. Its a little less than half now.

Depending on your needs and your climate (for timing purposes), you could periodically do a version of trench composting (you can look that up). Dig a trench or hole and bury/cover the partially composted stuff. As noted, by the time the materials are partly composted (first main run through the tumbler), they won't be of much interest to vermin. If it doesn't interfere with your gardening timing - for example trench and bury in fall - it should be perfectly fine by spring. (Actually with trench composting it's not that time sensitive, it's more your timing for planting /growing etc). Obviously doesn't work for all cases like if your areas of interest are mostly with perennials.

If you have a lot of moist additions, you made not need too much additional moisture. If you must err, err on the dry side. The contents should be as moist as the proverbial damp sponge---an oddly apt comparison. Regarding turning, you can't overturn it, and the more often you turn it, the faster the process, but it will start heating up without turning. Have fun with your new tumbler. What seems complex now will quickly become second nature to you.

Thanks so much!

Since you have already purchased a tumbler, go ahead and use it! Then ad it to some dry (brown) ingredients in a separate bin. Just be sure to keep the stuff in the tumbler moist.

I found that multiple compost ways worked all together!