Shitey horrible outdoor food waste bins..

[TinOfSpam]

What do you do with yours? No matter how I try, the biodegradable bags always end up splitting and food waste accumulates at the bottom of the bin. Today was bin day & there's a revolting 'mat' of mouldy food & maggots left behind after the bin men have emptied it. When I go to dispose of kitchen waste now it's warmer, a swarm of flies comes out when I lift the lid. It's just disgusting. How does your outdoor food bin fare? Do you just drop & dash when it comes to putting out the waste? There has to be a better way. On hot days it stinks too.

We don't have a problem, but careful not to overfill bags, to tie securely, any scraps of meat or fish kept in freezer until the night before the bin men come, and the small-ish food waste bin (filled from kitchen caddy) is never left in the sun.

How about buying some kitchen-caddy bags - very cheap - and using them double, but still not over filling. Plus of course making sure the bin is always closed tight so flies can't get in.
And of course any meat/fish very well wrapped and kept in the freezer beforehand. I read somewhere that bluebottles can smell dead meat from a mile away.

The compost heap takes most of our food waste so not much ends up in the caddy.

Compost bin here too, would recommend if you have space.

Try to keep moisture out of the bag too as much as possible... it seems condensation from warm tea bags and wet scrapings dissolve the bio-bag.

If it’s a wheely bin, we get ours cleaned monthly. It doesn’t cost much but has made a big difference. The man has a machine which brushes it all out and he also sprays it with something.

I think you are overfilling.

Ideally, clean after every collection day and you won't have any problems. We've also switched to paper bags as I think they hold up better.

I found a chicken carcass welded to the bottom of my brown bin a couple of month ago, in a gluey soup, bound together with grass clippings and shredded paper. Vom.

We find once there is any liquid at all the bags split.

What size is the bin? Do you have a massive garden with loads of garden waste as well ?

I agree with the others, too much food waste.

1. don't buy as much and use everything you buy
2. freeze anything that is leftover but could be used
3. feed the birds with the stuff they'll eat
4. compost vegetable and fruit peelings, teabags etc
5. only therefore throw away things like chicken bones, fish bones etc
6. wrap scraps in old newspaper before putting in the bin.
7. don't overfill bags
8. clean after each collection

We don’t have a food waste bin. Sounds revolting.

We're not allowed newspaper in our bin. OP could have one of the mini bins that only hold a few bags. I don't have space for a compost heap

We don’t have food waste bins where we live now but did in our former area. We would line the indoor bin with kitchen roll and would empty that twice a week into the outdoor bin - inside one was not much bigger than a waste paper bin and outside one would hold contents of 4-5 bags from indoor bin.

Outside bin was emptied weekly and we often found the biodegradable plastic bags would split quickly if there was any moisture in there so would double bag - and the bags were huge in comparison to the volume they could hold (they were even big for the outside bin) we switched to paper bag liners but then they seemed to change and were waxed inside so weren't any better than using carrier bags.

Now it all just goes in the black sacks and gets put out weekly - and we tend to only have 1 (occasionally 2) bin bag a week

We tend to leave smelly things in one corner of the fridge until bin day. Then it all goes out just before the bin men come.

Our council stopped collecting food waste, I assume it cost too much to process. I was almost relieved tbh as it gets so disgusting, especially in summer. Fond memories of being pregnant, opening the lid in hot weather and throwing up so hard I wet myself as the smell was so hideous...

Can't you compost your veg peeling?
My food waste bin doesn't get anywhere near full that way. I store it in the garage where it's cold. Biodegradable liner in and gets emptied every two weeks. The bag is not even a third full.

I don’t do food waste bins.

I recycle everything I possibly can, inside the house and from the garden, I meal plan and use up leftovers etc to try and avoid chucking stuff, we grow some of our own food and have hens for eggs, but I’m just not having rotting food sitting around attracting maggots for two weeks at a time till the bins go.

Just not gonna do it.

Tell me about compost bins. Am I right in thinking that they’re open at the bottom? How do you stop rats burrowing in!

We don't have a food bin and I don't want one !!

We don't use bags.
Food doesn't stick if you put an inch or so of water in the bottom so everything comes out when bin man empties it. Easy to rinse out afterwards. Kept in the shade next to outside tap.
We've never had a problem with maggots or flies. Perhaps because our food caddies have a secure lid that locks in place when handle upright so no smells can escape.

I couldn’t tolerate using those. Where I grew up the food waste went into your green bin so it wasn’t so bad. We also had nice thick bags which I haven’t been able to find in the UK.

I don't use bags - so wasteful. Waste food goes into the bin, which is washed out after collection (weekly here). Never had maggots. But no meat either - I don't know if that makes a difference.

Food bins are grim - we don’t have one as I refuse to deal with your sort of situation OP.

Our council offered compost bins instead of the brown food and garden waste bin. We applied for the swap and it is brilliant, no problem with maggotty bins. We compost all garden waste, eggshells, veg peelings, tea leaves, coffee grounds, etc you aren't supposed to put meat or fish in so we put that in pur main bin on the rare occasion that we have any waste.

You can get slim compost bins if you don't have much space, smaller footprint than a wheely bin. Then you can use the resulting compost on the garden!

We have a small caddy for next to the kitchen sink, unlined , which then gets emptied into the larger food waste outside. The small one is washed out ( I don’t use the council supplied one anymore after it cracked - I’ve got a Good Oxo one that has a removable inner and looks more attractive)

The outdoor one , kept in the shade, is washed out after the weekly emptying, air dried then lined with the brown paper bags ( from fruit from the market) . Newspaper would do otherwise . It completely solved the horrible mess accumulating and setting hard, as the OP described

In the summer meat or fish scraps are kept in the freezer until recycling day. We double check that the handle on both is kept forward. to lock into position to stop the flies getting in.

It’s a simple, clean procedure and means our general bags ( they don’t allow bins here ) haven’t got food and go out early as required without being attractive to the foxes,

I have no shade or garage and 4 big wheely bins and food waste is only collected every 2 weeks (3 weeks for other 3 bins).