No rubbish fortnight

[Tay]

smokers - have filterless rollies. The butts are compostable...

I don't think i can do this one. Stupid work gets in the way (they've cut off internet access this week )

Good luck though!

I'm not sure if this is a good idea as I had heard that tobacco mosaic virus easily passes to plants such as tomatoes and potatoes. Maybe if you have two compost heaps, one where the compost goes on vegetables (without fag ends) and one for flowers (with butts) it would be ok.

Aside from that, as a smoker of roll-ups, filterless cigarettes are foul! At least the filters protect us a bit... Still bad for your health, I know, but better than nothing.

[AmalWarrior]

Has anyone tried this challenge again-since 2006? I think I would give it a go...anyone else game?

[Skippy]

I've looked at what goes in our bin and have to agree that reducing to zero is almost impossible. We do have a good recycling scheme around us and can request an additional bin for that at no extra cost. As others have pointed out plastic film contaminated with food and polystyrene do seem to be the biggest problem. I suppose one small consulation is that our waste is burnt for electricity , not an ideal but at least hopefully better than landfill. As the contents get used for fuel I don't feel too worried about filling it with those timber ofcuts I don't put on the wood burner , treated or painted stuff that is generated by my work and which is otherwise unrecyclable . Talk of the wood burner , we tend to put our bones in their . It destroys the edible bits so less temptations for pests and it makes the bones easily crusherable to go on the garden.

[AmalWarrior]

I look the idea, so I've been looking around to see how it might work. The biggest issue for me that I found was butter. I avoid palm oil, so that's all margarines out. Butter comes in foil, that has a plastic lining, and therefore is not recyclable. I did see a butter stick in a kind of paper wrapper, but it said nothing about recycling. I suppose oily foods will always be an awkward thing. I did discover some rice being sold in a fabric bag though, which surprised me. There's also pasta that comes in cardboard boxes (penne, fusili and lasagne sheets-brown or white), although they do have a little plastic window. Why do we need to see dried pasta? Surely we know what it looks like!? They could perhaps put up a pasta index, showing what each type looks like...
I haven't found any dried fruit in jars or tins as yet, so no more raisins or sultanas.
I think it is possible if you make and grow most of your food. Probably just eat fruit and veg for a fortnight, bought loose. Stickers from fruit!

[Flo]

Hmm - minimum waste is the best I can hope for it seems. Junk mail is a problem - postman is paid to deliver it which doesn't help as are a couple of other firms who must do cheaper and more focused than the postman. And also we seem to get a lot of "charity bags" hoping for our second hand clothes. Even if you leave the bags out empty they are never collected again. I do find uses for these but they still end up as waste as they wear out.

I suspect that I'll have a nearly no waste couple of weeks when my number 2 allotment stops turning up glass, old plant labels, rusty metal and other buried treasure as well as having a club root problem which means that the roots can't be composted. I wouldn't trust burning to cure the problem either.

Oh and bus tickets. Use the bus a lot. Even if I put the bus tickets in the bus receptacle, I'm producing waste though it doesn't go in my bin. Receipts from bank card transactions.

[Skippy]

It's not really reducing the rubbish from junk mail but I used to send it back when it came with a prepaid envelope . Normally I'd try to fill it with another company's junk mail first.

[Weedo]

Flo

This paper suggest composting processes for club root affected brassicas

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf ... 06.01399.x

I would suggest that solarisation would also work - The usual method is to place the material in a very heavy duty black plastic bag (exactly the type you won't want to use) and leave it in the sun for a couple of weeks. I have no experience of this but a small glass or poly cloche may also work? it would be essential to put a barrier between the material and the soil. Otherwise burning?

[Flo]

Interesting Weedo. It's quite widespread on our allotment site (along with Mare's Tail) but this is the first time that I've ever had to deal with club root. Just one more problem on a plot with "interesting" soil. Thing is - we get the odd day over here where temperatures are high enough to eradicate club root as per the experiment.

[RenewableCandy]

Several letterboxes on doors near us have little home-made notices saying 'No Charity Bags Please'.

I don't know whether these are respected or not: I need to put one up and find out!

We get one of the s*ds practically each week, always for something we've not heard of and which is probably a scam, and the daftest thing of all is we live within 20 yards of (1) a clothes bank, and (2) a charity shop!

[Weedo]

Here's a different slant on rubbish and littering
https://psnews.com.au/2018/04/02/skyfal ... ts-future/

[ina]

We get one of the s*ds practically each week, always for something we've not heard of and which is probably a scam, and the daftest thing of all is we live within 20 yards of (1) a clothes bank, and (2) a charity shop!

I use them for rubbish bags - saves me having to buy the black variety...

[Skippy]

I use them for rubbish too . Perhaps it's guilt thing but I tend to turn them inside out before filling them.

[ina]

I use them for rubbish too . Perhaps it's guilt thing but I tend to turn them inside out before filling them.

[Flo]

Nah - let the world know what's become of these unwanted bags.

[happyhippy]

I re use charity bags to line my kitchen bins with,I sort my house out every 6 mths so usually don't have spare stuff to give away.I am going to buy a sticker "No junk Mail"for my front door.