Home Composting
Composting is good for your garden and the environment
Making compost is a natural way to turn your kitchen and garden waste into a valuable and nutrient-rich food for your garden. It's easy to make and use. Compost improves your soil's condition and your plants and flowers will love it.
Composting at home is important because it’s one of the few ways in which food waste can be used instead of going to landfill.
Why do I need to compost when my waste will break down in landfill anyway?
When food waste is sent to landfill, air can’t get to the organic waste. As the waste breaks down it creates a harmful greenhouse gas, methane, which damages the Earth's atmosphere.
When this same waste is composted above ground at home, oxygen helps the waste to decompose without creating much methane. Home composting is good news for the planet.
Where can I buy a composter?
Discounted composters and water butts are available to Bournemouth residents from Get Composting or by phoning 0844 571 4444. These composters are available on special offer - 'Buy One Get One Half Price'.
What can I compost at home
Green Waste
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Brown Waste
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No thanks
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Uncooked fruit and vegetables and their peelings
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Paper towels and napkins (but not those that have been used to mop up anything containing meat such as gravy)
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Glossy paper and magazines
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Teabags
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Scrunched up cardboard
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Cooked food
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Ground coffee
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Dry leaves and twigs
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Dairy products
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Grass cuttings
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Non-recyclable paper
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Meat,fish or bones
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Soft prunings
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Straw and hay
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Pet poo and litter
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Old bedding plants
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Saw dust and wood chippings - sparingly
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Fats and oils
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Cut flowers
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Corn cobs and stalks
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Weeds gone to seed
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Annual weeds
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Eggshells – still be visible in finished compost, but add calcium to your soil
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Stale bread
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Food Waste Container
Don’t forget, you can put your waste cooked food (including dairy products, meat fish, bones and stale bread) in your Food Waste Container. We’ll take them away and recycle them for you.