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81 things you can compost
Our list moves well beyond raw veggies. You're likely to find a surprise or two.
Thu, Mar 01 2012 at 12:02 PM
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Photo: Jupiterimages
Home composting isn’t just for farmers anymore! The practice is becoming increasingly popular among urban environmentalists who are eager to cut their landfill contributions: from apartment dwellers growing gardens on top of NYC roofing, to folks who participate in their local municipal compost program, to homeowners looking to turn their backyards into a teeny tiny sustainable city farms. Composting is a key component of the eco-friendly puzzle, because it takes waste that’s destined for landfills and turns it into usable, nutrient-rich soil, which is perfect for gardening. Most people focus on kitchen scraps, but that’s just the very tip of the composting iceberg. Did you know you could also include the following? Just be sure that anything you compost is not made from plastic (in the case of the rope) and free of toxic chemicals (sawdush, ashes).
- Dryer lint
- “Dust bunnies”
- The insides of a vacuum bag (just empty the bag into the compost bin)
- The contents of your dustpan (just use discretion)
- Coffee grounds
- Coffee filters
- Tea bags/loose leaf tea
- Soy/rice/almond/etc milk
- Nut shells (but not walnut, which may be toxic to plants)
- Pumpkin/sunflower/sesame seeds (chop them to ensure they won’t grow)
- Avocado pits (chop them up so they won’t sprout)
- Pickles
- Stale tortilla chips/potato chips
- Stale crackers
- Crumbs (bread or other baked goods)
- Old breakfast cereal
- Bran (wheat or oat, etc)
- Seaweed/nori/kelp
- Tofu/tempeh
- Frozen fruits and vegetables
- Expired jam or jelly
- Egg shells
- Old, moldy "soy dairy" and other dairy substitutes
- Stale Halloween candy and old nutrition/protein bars
- Popcorn kernels (post-popping, the ones that didn’t make it)
- Old herbs and spices
- Cooked rice
- Cooked Pasta
- Oatmeal
- Peanut shells
- Booze (beer and wine)
- Wine corks
- Egg cartons (not Styrofoam)
- Toothpicks
- Q-tips (not the plastic ones)
- Bamboo skewers
- Matches
- Sawdust
- Pencil shavings
- Fireplace ash (fully extinguished and cooled)
- Burlap sacks
- Cotton or wool clothes, cut into strips
- Paper towels
- Paper napkins
- Paper table cloths
- Paper plates (non wax- or plastic-coated)
- Crepe paper streamers
- Holiday wreaths
- Balloons (latex only)
- Raffia fibers (wrapping or decoration)
- Excelsior (wood wool)
- Old potpourri
- Dried flowers
- Fresh flowers
- Dead houseplants (or their dropped leaves)
- Human hair (from a home haircut or saved from the barber shop)
- Toenail clippings
- Trimmings from an electric razor
- Pet hair
- Domestic bird and bunny droppings
- Feathers
- Fish food
- Aquatic plants (from aquariums)
- Dog food
- Rawhide dog chews
- Ratty old rope
- The dead flies on the windowsill
- Pizza boxes and cereal boxes (shredded first)
- Toilet paper and paper towel rolls (shredded first)
- Paper muffin/cupcake cups
- Cellophane bags (real cellophane, not regular clear plastic)
- Kleenex (including used)
- Condoms (latex only)
- Old loofas (real, not synthetic)
- Cotton balls
- Tampon applicators (cardboard, not plastic) and tampons (including used)
- Newspaper
- Junk mail
- Old business cards (not the glossy ones)
- Old masking tape
- White glue/plain paste.
Happy composting, everyone. Please tell us what you compost!
Sayward Rebhal originally wrote this story for Networx.com. It is reprinted with permission here.
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A lot of things I wouldn't have thought about! And a lot of things I don't WANT to think about.
I'm not a fan of these generic lists. Per other comments, how fast something composts is determined by the conditions and primarily temperature. If you can hot compost (100-140F) things change a lot.
In our house there is no science to composting. If it's edible (including dairy and meat) it goes in the compost, A hot compost attracts no animals nor does a frozen one (in the winter). If the compost is still chunky, I toss er in the garden in early spring and cover with a lot of dirt, by planting time it's a blessing.
Usually, you can compost more items (and divert more waste) using a local compost pickup service. l@CompostNow even accepts bones, meat, dairy, compostable plastics, pizza boxes, and more.
Use this map to find a compost pickup service in your area: http://compostnow.org/compost-services/
Preparing my compost now in time for spring. I get my seeds from myheirloomseeds.com and totally non-gmo heirloom seeds and of course open pollinated. I used grass clippings, and everything possible that comes from my kitchen waste in terms of vegetable scraps. Old newspaper as well has hair from the family haircuts. Thanks for posting a wonderful list.
What about a similar list for vermicomposting? I'm not sure my worms will eat dryer lint or condoms?!
Thanks that answers some of my can I compost questions I've been debating lately, some include the matches and hair which I wasn't sure of...
I compost egg shells, fruit and veg peelings or left overs, teas bags etc. some of the more well known ones, but now with this list think I need to invest in a bigger compost bin :D
I don't know about the dryer lint, wouldn't it typically contain a lot of synthetic fibers? Any idea how long the latex, um, items, take to break down?
The trick is to compost before you add it into the flowers.
Someone added a fresh pear right in the flower pot with
impatiences and killed them. Beware..
I include cooked veggies as long as there's no oil/fat in them
Uuuh...latex condoms?? That didn't slightly bother anyone else??
Ummm, how does one know if they are latex?
Things I avoid putting into my compost: bones, meat of any kind,
fats or oils, plastics metal, sweepings from the curb or alley, and foods containing high amounts of salt.
I find that turning the compost when adding foodscraps prevents rodents from enjoying a buffet.
I just have a problem with #31 ... who has left over beer? :-)
I worry about seeds sprouting in my compost. Volunteer tomatoes and pumpkins I don't mind, if they can make it; but what about pulling noxious weeds in flower and then composting them? Do I dare? And what about shovelling out a buried sidewalk covered with henbit or grass and adding that to my compost?
i believe that gmo, toxic (containing herbicide or pesticide), or non- organic foods can all be composted. If turned regularly (every two days) and kept for long enough (about 3 months to a year), all toxins and even radioactive material becomes inert in the compost.
I think that's a bit too general. I'm sure the breakdown time of chemicals is highly variable; not every pesticide is going to break down in 3 months. Composting does nothing to speed breakdown of radioactive material; if it did, we'd have a handy little solution to our nuclear waste problem ...
We have crows around and love to feed them the odds and ends of meats and bones, we have hens so we give them some of the extra cooked pasta, cereal, and bird food - if it gets buggy. We also have red worms which add castings and help keep compost loose.
You feed cows meat! Isn't that part of the problem how Mad-Cow disease started, feeding cows their own?
*Crows* really now
Crows, not cows.
"Buggy" birdseed is totally safe to feed your birds. If anything, it gives extra protein. Ask your supplier. I have had this verified several times. If the bugs just really bother you, simply freeze the seed, then thaw. It will kill the larva before they hatch.
Please correct me if I'm wrong-I don't think sawdust from treated wood should be composted.
If 90 something percent of cotton is GMO, Wouldn't our lint be GMO also?
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