Daily Dump provides a comprehensive booklet with the products. But we find that there are some common mistakes that are made by many first time composting customers.

Not adding equal amounts of dried leaves/ sawdust / or paper.

This makes the pile too wet and smelly and attracts a lot of flies. You need the carbon of the leaves, etc to offset the moisture in the nitrogen rich kitchen waste.

You have to put Leaves everyday of the same volume as your kitchen waste when you begin and later on adjust this to suit the moisture levels in the pile.

Not stirring at least once in 4 days. Leaving the pile to become compacted, wet and slimy and therefore smelly.

Alternating kitchen waste with dried leaves, etc is one way of avoiding compaction of pile and also stirring the pile once in 4 days helps. If your pile smells, it means you are not doing it right!

Not adding enough neem or turmeric powder so the pile gets too many maggots and the user feels repulsed.

No customer can factor in the maggots, the black soldier fly maggots can be quite prolific and the best thing to do is to add 2 tablespoons of neem or turmeric powder and rock salt in all containers every week. These maggots are harmless creatures and are good for composting.

Not covering the pile with paper, so you get too many fruit flies - which also find their way into the kitchen and dining area.

Customers underestimate the term “cover”. By cover we mean fully cover the surface of the waste so that the flies have no exposed food waste to settle on. Tuck the paper in on all sides tigtly.

Not adding enough dried leaves in the bottom container to absorb the leechate (liquid released during composting).

Because the last container is not seen, most customers do not look at it and sometimes the leechate is a lot and the bed of leaves at the bottom is inadequate to absorb it. Once in two weeks its wise to inspect all three containers (Units). Remove water in case it has collected in the bottom unit. Add Dried leaves.

Not mixing half done compost with fresh kitchen waste.

Most customers don't think that this will help reduce problems of smell and flies. We find this is a simple and sure way of reducing the problems. Mixing different vintages of composting matter helps accelerate the time of all the piles.

Not adding enough water and letting the pile go dry

Some customers as so scared about moisture that they let the pile go very dry. This stops composting totally. The microorganisms need moisture to live on and work. So make sure that the pile is moist not soggy-but moist.

Summary of Additives that can go into the composter

Neem Oil Cake Powder

1 table spoon every 4 days

Baking Soda

 1 teaspoon every 4 days

Accelerator

 1 teaspoon of the microbial culture that we supply (every 4 days) or you can add urine,
cow dung, or semi-done compost