Compost at Home

Did you know?

Around 70% of food waste is edible and is best placed on our plates not the bin. Learn more about how to reuse leftovers and save food scraps before they enter the bin, by joining The Great UnWaste here.

Composting is a great way to improve your environmental footprint. Your food scraps and garden waste can be turned into a garden additive to keep your plants thriving. Reducing waste to landfill is great for the planet as it will help reduce harmful emissions such as methane, which is created as waste breaks down in a landfill environment.

Why compost in the garden?

• It improves soil quality, water retention and garden vitality.
• It helps suppress plant diseases and pests.
• It reduces the need for chemical fertilisers, saving you money.

Whether you’ve got a large backyard or an apartment with balcony space, you can still compost at home. Popular options include:

• Compost units (outdoors)
• Worm farms.
• Bokashi bins (fermentation)

You can also consider taking your food scraps to your local community garden; find your closest here.

You could also find a neighbour that can take your organic waste. Peels is an app that can also be used to share your food scraps with a neighbour who has more space or chickens.

Compost units (outdoors)

• Dwelling suitability: Houses, schools or anywhere with a garden space.
• Efficiency: Dependent on carbon/nitrate ratio and aeration.
• Fertiliser created: Solid.

If there are more than three people who live in your household and you have some outdoor area with a patch of open soil or grass, this may be the best option for you. This type of composting system is not suitable for meat scraps and bones.

Worm farms

• Dwelling suitability: House, apartment, office (with or without garden).
• Efficiency: Can depend on worms, general quite fast.
• Fertiliser created: Liquid and solid.

This type of system can work with most households, you’ll just need a nice shady spot to keep your worms happy. Depending on the worms, most food scraps will be able to be broken down in this system.

Tip! Keep worms in a shaded spot. Check out our specialist worm farm workshop where you can learn how to successfully set-up a worm farm at home.

Bokashi bins (fermentation)

• Dwelling suitability: House, apartment or office with no garden.
• Efficiency: Efficient break down into liquid, though dry scraps take longer and need to be buried in soil.
• Fertiliser created: Liquid.

A bokashi bin will suit smaller households (one to two people) and/or those without open garden space such as paved courtyards or balconies. You will still require some soil space to bury the compost later on, such as garden beds or planters. Or you can empty fermented scraps directly into your green-lidded FOGO bin.

The City’s FOGO service does not accept animal dropping in your FOGO bin, animal dropping will still need to be placed in your general waste bin. There are a number of parasites and harmful bacteria in dog poo / animal droppings that can survive the composting process. Using compost that has dog poo content is considered a health risk when used in a food garden.

There are ways for households to compost pet poo at home. Want to learn more? Come along to our upcoming workshop in April on how worms can help with composting pet poo.

Check out upcoming free workshops below. Registrations will open one month before the workshop date.

If no workshops are listed above, reach out to the Sustainability and Environment team for further information.

* A subsidised Worm Farm Café Kit is offered at this workshop.

Did you know?

We are partnered with Grow It Local, and Rockingham residents can access on-demand workshops and resources through this online platform. Visit Grow It Local for more information.