If you compost your veg peelings, etc, will you still do this when the council food waste collection kicks in?

[MyThreeWords]

The statutory provision of council food waste collection is coming in very shortly in most council areas, so I wondered how home composters are responding to that?

I currently compost my veg peelings and fruit waste, but my heap isn't good enough for me to compost any other food waste -- it would just lead to vermin if I tried to put other food waste in.

Until recently, I'd been assuming that I would carry on with my own veg/fruit composting when the council food waste collections come in, but it's just dawned on me what a faff that would be. Two caddies in the kitchen. Yuck. One of them decanted into my compost heap and the other into the council food bin.

Those of you who already have food waste collections, has it changed your composting habits? If you stopped adding fruit/veg waste to your own compost bin, how, if at all, did that effect the success of your compost.

Those of you who don't yet have council food waste collections but will do soon, what are your plans?

The issue with citrus and coffee grinds is in a self contained small space wormery where they will increase the acidity temporarily due to their bulk volume compared to the rest of the worm tray. Both are absolutely fine in any normal compost bin.

It is, though!

If you put something like a chicken carcass into a countertop caddy, it'll be disgusting within a very short time - it'll smell much worse in your outside bin just for being left somewhere warm for a few hours.

It's not an insurmountable problem - you just need to accept that you can't use a countertop caddy for waste like this - but I do wish councils would issue bins with a proper clip top that are designed to go outside, and not all of them seem to. I take @senua's point that recycling is always changing, but when we first got household waste bins they were so flimsy you couldn't have stored them outside unless you had yard space - if they'd been on the pavement they'd have been knocked over and broken - and it's not ideal.

Yes, I think that for things like bones, fish, etc, the little countertop caddy is a bit of an unwanted detour. It needs to go straight to the outside caddy. I thnk that's why thr dual-caddy countertop system seemed a bit yuck to me. I'm fine with veg/fruit waste no the countertop (even with a few fruitflies nosing about) but I can't see myself collecting dead animal bits there.

Luckily, I can put the outside caddy right by my back door, so shouldn't be a problem, esp in the warmer months.

No foxes here, because we live in the countryside , where they still have the decency to be shy and stay in the woods. I had a rat in my compost bin once, but my trusty terrier zapped it.

EDIT: Do murdered compost-heap rats go in the council food recycling caddy or general waste??

We had this exact waste food recycling system 10 or 15 years ago. We all followed the instructions. The local foxes got into the (lockable) bins. The food waste was strewn all over the streets. We all got rats. The council wouldn't help with the rats. Eventually the food waste recycling stopped.
Over the last 30 years we have had various recycling systems. Sort into 3 different boxes, the a couple of years later don't sort, just put it in a large blue bin. General waste in black bin, garden waste in another bin. Now they won't take garden waste unless you pay extra. Some things have to be taken to the tip, but only if you have a car and a sticker with your car's reg on it from the council.
People steal the bins.
People/ passers by put waste into your recycling bin then the council won't take it.
Now we are back to the exact same food recycling bins that the foxes can open...

You’re assuming that pp will take the food waste outside. I doubt it, it will just go into her normal inside rubbish bin. There’s no difference.

We have a lockable outside bin - still put them inside one of the other wheely bins until it’s time for it to be collected. Urban foxes are canny.

Not assuming anything; just giving my perspective.

EDIT: Do murdered compost-heap rats go in the council food recycling caddy or general waste??

Eeeew!
The answer is: dead wildlife gets lobbed into the field and the corvidae deal with it.

I would still be composting... mainly because I'd be shocked if our council announced that they were actually planning on collecting our food bins. We have them, I used it when I first moved here, and it didn't get collected at all.

I'm hoping to go back to the days of having pets that enjoy the extra vegetables that my dogs and reptile don't/can't eat. Some chickens and rabbits would be lovely 😊

I guess that the only food going into the council bin will be cooked scraps and bones? Everything else goes into my compost bins, so I imagine there will be very little for collecting!

Totally agree.

I do compost a bit - mostly peelings and grass.

Food goes in my main kitchen bin, it’s emptied at least every two days and because the bin is deep I’m not faced with looking at the slop every time I want to chuck something out.

the caddy approach (and I’ve tried it) makes me feel sick. It’s really grim

We must have amazing locks on our bins as I live in an area absolutely rife with foxes (south London) and have never seen one busted into.

Yes, they get into street bins and the bags that fly-tippers selfishly leave by their bins if they are full, but not the kerbside caddies.

The food waste we put out is usually a few slices of bread or stale biscuits or cake, egg shells, bones, pizza crusts, unwanted mouthfuls of food from plates (but we try very hard to cook and eat what we actually want/need). No slop here.

@MyThreeWords murdered rats and other dead things go into whichever gets collected first (food, garden, or general) - but hidden under something else as the bin men here reject anything unusual. They freak out about entirely compostable cat litter.

There was old carpet hiding in my garden when I moved in, and they refused to take it, so I cut it into smaller sections and hid it in bin bags. Sometimes it feels more difficult than I imagine it would be to get rid of a human body.

so, household rubbish bin sitting in the kitchen with food scraps mixed up, emptied once a week?
or
food caddy sitting in the kitchen with food scraps in emptied once a week?

*more frequent emptyings are also available.

Can't see the difference myself. If the food caddy smells, then the bin would smell too. In fact it is better, because when we have something that will smell, we can wrap it in its own bag and put it straight into the bigger caddy outside. So overall fewer smells in the kitchen.

Where I live, food bins are emptied weekly, landfill bins fortnightly. So if you put your food waste in your landfill bin you are more likely to get foul smells and maggots.

In very hot weather I freeze food scraps until the night before bin day. Haven't seen a maggot yet.

We've had weekly food waste collections for years round here. Everyone manages just fine. A lot of what goes in there shouldn't be put on a compost heap anyway.

We have had a food collection for many years, and have always still composted. We have two small caddies in the utility room one for each.