• List of Acceptable Materials

last modified January 2, 2009 by lobotomy718

C O M P O S T
Looking for a place to compost? You can also join Greene Acres as a composting member -- no meetings, no open hours, no obligations, you just get a place to bring your compost. If you help out by maintaining the bins and turning the compost, you can take a bit home for your own use. A compost membership is $5, which we use to pay for keys, signs, outreach and hardware. If you don't want your own key, you can bring compost by for free anytime the garden is open.

Compost Guidelines: Only add kitchen waste to the metal bins near the gate. Yard waste should go in the big open bins. Add your scraps and cover them with a layer of sawdust. Make sure you replace the lid--it keeps the rats out.

Okay to Compost
vegetable scraps, fruit peels, coffee grounds & filters, tea bags, dirty napkins, bread, cereal, egg shells, paper plates,

Not Okay
pet waste, kitty litter, bones and meat, plastic bags, rubberbands, foam trays, plastic plates, bbq ashes

 Compost Guidelines for Fort Greene Park

How can I help with the Project at the FortGreene Farmers Market?

In order to keep the project sustainable and volunteer-run, please:

MAKE LESS WASTE! Bake, cook, and trim bad spots on veggies and use your food!

Dump your waste in proper receptacles and avoid any trash or plastic bags to mix in. The smaller the waste the easier it is to process.

  Cut up your large veggie waste and always remove labels, rubber bands and twisties

Do not overfill garbage pails with compost waste. There are always extra bags so please change out a bag if it is filling up.   

Make a Donation; we need funds to keep the program running!

Okay to Compost

vegetable scraps, fruit peels, coffee grounds & filters, tea bags, dirty napkins, bread, cereal, egg and nut shells, wood ash, cut flowers, house plant trimmings, brewery waste, hops and pomace

Not Okay
pet waste, kitty litter, bones fish and meat, plastic bags, rubberbands, foam trays, plastic plates, bbq ashes, plastic bags of any kind, biodegradable plastic bags, bulky yard waste, dairy waste, liquids, fats and oils, commercial loads.

But My Plastic is Biodegradable!
Bio-bags are a great idea, but they don't compost well. When your scraps and discards leave the market on our fine compost tricycle, they head to a local community garden, not to an industrial compost site. Volunteers dump the bags by hand, and build and turn piles. We've found that biodegradable plastics aren't breaking down in our compost systems and they've become a real pain. So we're asking you not to bring them anymore.

Can I bring you my ...

... yard waste?  No. Sorry. If you have bagged leaves that you want to get composted, please grab a copy of our resource sheet and bring your leaves directly to a community garden that can compost them. You can also bring small, chopped up yard waste to a local community garden, but keep in mind that participating gardens don't have a way to break down branches, so if you can't chop it up yourself, we can't take it.

... seven huge bags of coffee grounds? No! If you are producing large amounts of compostable material, we'd love to work with you to find a place to bring it, but riding the compost trike is not nearly as easy as it looks and we do not want to get into the commercial waste hauling business! If you're a business, we need you to support us by working directly with a garden to bring your compost over.

... saw dust? Yes! We almost always need new sources of clean sawdust. Please check with us first, however. We can't take sawdust that contains paint, chemicals, glues or remnants of particle board, plywood or pressure treated woods.

When do I get compost back?

Compost is labor intensive and it takes up a lot of space. The volunteers and community gardens who donate their land and labor to this project use the finished compost to grow flowers and vegetables and make our neighborhoods beautiful. Seasonally we do a compost give-back day, and distribute compost in small amounts. If you can't wait or you need more compost than we can give you, please get involved! See http://www.openplans.org/projects/compost  for more information on how you can contribute your time and labor to the project.