I live in an apartment. We are a little crammed in here at the moment, but here we are. The only outdoor space we have that is "ours" is a small balcony, so I long thought that we wouldn't be able to compost effectively. What's more, I have somewhat of a brown thumb, so the point was sort of lost. Most of the things that I grew on the balcony died, sooner or later, so what's the point?
I started composting, just to try it out, almost a year ago now. It quickly became apparent to me why I should be composting when we realized the drastic reduction in the amount of trash we were taking to the dumpster. Where we had been taking almost a bag per day for our family of four (plus three cats), we were now taking a bag a week. Unfortunately for me, the homemade backyard compost tumblers I made out of trash cans were extremely inefficient and quickly became anaerobic and infested with flies. Nasty doesn't cover it. Also, the sight of me tipping the compost tumblers on their sides and rolling them around the balcony must have been amusing for anyone who cared to watch.
I quickly moved on to worms. An urban compost tumbler was out of my budget at that time, so I needed a cheaper solution to deal with my kitchen compost. My worms arrived hungry and writhing (which totally freaked me out, by the way), and quickly took over where my compost tumblers had left off. I even fed them a lot of the old kitchen compost still in the compost tumblers and they enjoyed it quite nicely.
Sadly, this was all before I knew just HOW important it is to keep a plastic worm bin out of the sun, and those thousands of red wigglers soon met their untimely demise. But, I persevered, and here I am today up to my eyeballs in worms!
I want to share with all you other apartment dwellers the system that I use to deal with our kitchen compost. It becomes refined as the weeks pass by (thankfully!), so check back for updates and tips.
First off, we now have an indoor worm bin. I use the Gusanito worm bin because, frankly, I sell them and needed to test out the product. Actually, now that I have actually read and am following the directions I like it a quite a bit. I used to keep the Gusanito worm bin right next to the sink so that I could put kitchen compost right into the bin. This didn't work for several reasons. First, my husband wouldn't stop complaining about it being next to the sink (I actually thought it was quite effective at keeping our wandering kitties off the counter, but I digress). Second, I realized that adding fresh scraps to the bin wasn't quite working due to the introduction of fruit flies and fugus gnats to the system.
Here's what I do now:
We happen to be blessed with a nice sized pantry, so the Gusanito worm bin is in there now. I keep a small container next to the sink to put any veggie scraps into while I cook or clean up. Then, when the container is full, I put it into a larger open container on the top shelf of our freezer. Freezing the scraps is an extremely useful way of keeping flies at bay; they're just not interested in the stuff after it's been frozen. However the worms LOVE the kitchen compost once it's been frozen because it breaks down more easily and they can get through the material faster. So once a week or so I take the open container in the freezer, put it into a new tray of the Gusanito worm bin, cover it with about an inch of peat moss (seriously, an inch, no sprinkling, you need a bunch) or coconut coir, and VOILA! You don't have to defrost the scraps' by the time the worms make it into that new layer the scraps will have long turned to yummy mush again.
In short:
Bin in pantry or closet
Small kitchen compost next to sink
Large frozen kitchen compost in easily accessible part of freezer
Feed frozen scraps weekly
Cover generously with peat moss or coconut coir
Here's what I want to do in addition:
Now that I have finally "mastered" the art of keeping worms inside the kitchen without tons of flies around, I am getting ready to move on to an urban compost tumbler for my balcony to deal with everything my worms can't handle (onions, citrus, any extra grains, etc.). Compost tumblers come in all sizes, and they just happen to make one that fits right on my tiny balcony. The beauty of an urban compost tumbler like this is that you don't have to roll it around, you just spin it on its axis. I can't wait until it arrives!
So, this is how to make worm compost in a tiny apartment. Have a little perseverance, read the directions, and check back here to learn about my own blunders so that you don't do the same idiotic things I have done. Don't have anywhere to use the compost? Donate it to an urban garden... maybe they'll hook you up with some fresh produce!
Good worming!
