Composting Programs
BACKYARD COMPOSTERS are easy to do and can reduce your household waste by roughly one-third to one-half. And better yet, the results are great for your lawn and garden. To help get you started, the TNRD offers handy backyard composters at a discounted rate. These backyard composters are available in various municipal offices and community centers throughout the TNRD.
THE GREEN CONE takes all kinds of off waste – meat, bones, dairy, coked, raw, oils –anything from the kitchen table and even pet feces (but no cat litter).
How it works –
- The basket is buried below the ground, that’s where the waste remains (it will never come above the lip of the basket).
- The double walled green cone acts as incubator
- The natural process combines heat and air movement to create an accelerated aerobic environment that enables and aggressive mould colony, which breaks the food down into liquid that is absorbed into the earth.
It produces no product – no compost – but the earth around the cone is enriched with the same nutrients that a compost tea would contain.
After installation, all you do is dump the waste in every day – no turning, stirring or emptying. After two or three years, there may be sludge build up that can be removed by undoing the screws that hold the cone to the basket and scooping it out.
WORM COMPOSTING is an easy way to turn your kitchen scraps into rich compost for your garden. Perfect for indoor or outdoor use, for apartment dwellers, or for those with limited mobility, worm composting is clean, compact and easy to handle. Worm composting uses a special type of worm called a ‘redwiggler.’ These hungry little worms can eat their own body weight in one day, and are well suited to the slightly moist decomposing materials found in a worm bin. As these worms eat through the food waste, they produce nutrient-rich castings that can be used in the garden. Once they have eaten through the bedding material, simply follow the steps to ‘harvest’ the castings and start over again. Worms like it best at temperature of between 13° and 25° Celsius, so it’s important they are kept in the shade in summer and inside during the winter months.
Locations to Purchase Backyard Composters
The Green Cones and Worm Composters can be purchased at a subsidized rate from the TNRD facility on Mission Flats Road in Kamloops. To arrange purchase, please call ahead to 250-377-2596