Arthur Cresswell wrote:

For the past two years I have not put out a trash can at the
curb while my neighbor's trash cans are filled to the brim.
....
So, given that my brown trash bin is never used, what on earth do
people *put* in their trash bin, that can't be recycled otherwise?

complicated things that don't qualify as
e-waste, some food wastes that i would like to
compost, but Ma will not, plastics that don't
fit our recycler qualifications (like many others
our recycler will not take styrofoam or food
wrappers or many other wrappers).

as for many organic materials and yard wastes
that others throw out or use curb recycling here
i either put them through the worm bins or they
get buried in a garden. bones eventually get
broken down, or just bury them deep enough and
the worms and soil creatures will work at them
through time. in the older days you could crush
or grind the bones up for use in the gardens or
as chicken grit. food/veggie scraps all go to
the worm bins eventually (i might dry some first
because i don't want them sprouting and growing
later).

we have some friends in the city who bring us
their leaves, wood ashes and whatever else they
want to get rid of that is an organic material.
this helps us a lot in our many gardens so we
give them stuff back in the form of jams or
produce and they can also reuse the leaf bags
several times before we also bury those in the
garden. cardboard layers work well as smothering
for weeds. plastic coated cardboards i recycle
at the curb, i don't want plastics in the gardens.

all paper stuffs are used as weed barriers or
are shredded and composted with the worms.

i've emptied my wastebasket in my room here
one or twice a year and often it it mostly fuzz
from frayed carpet samples that i use to slide
the worm buckets around on (instead of scraping
up the wood floor).

i do have e-waste to recycle from time to time
and batteries from gadgets.

most the trash going out here as trash is often
from projects Ma is working on with fabrics and
i don't want to end up with stuff not rotting so
i just let it all go. even if i know cottons or
other natural fibers will rot eventually, i don't
want to deal with sorting it out or trying to get
her to do it. once in a while i'll put an old
shirt in the ground to give added fill, but i seem
to keep finding threads that do not rot so i don't
like to do that much any more.


songbird