Hello everyone,
How do I get rid of the clouds of whitefly and a sizeable ant colony which
both appear to have taken up residence in my compost bin? Am I going to to
have to nuke it? I recently moved it because it wasn't doing anything much.
cheers,
Mike.

On Sun, 7 May 2006 21:29:35 +0100, MiRe wrote
(in article ):

Hello everyone,
How do I get rid of the clouds of whitefly and a sizeable ant colony which
both appear to have taken up residence in my compost bin? Am I going to to
have to nuke it? I recently moved it because it wasn't doing anything much.
cheers,

It sounds as if it's too dry. I would add some liquid, preferably your own
pee which is the best possible home-made compost activator, and that will get
it going.



--
Sally in Shropshire, UK
bed and breakfast near Ludlow: http://www.stonybrook-ludlow.co.uk
Burne-Jones/William Morris window in Shropshire church:
http://www.whitton-stmarys.org.uk

Yup. Ants won't eat soggy messy food, so if you've got ants, there's
something dry enough to be intact enough to attract them. Same thing
with whiteflies.

Acidity is generaly a good addition to soil, so if you use a couple
gallons of plain vinegar and then do regular watering, that should
deter the insects, enrich your compost, destroy their living
conditions, and get the compost going again.

Good luck.

Why would urine be a better compost activator than anything else? Urine
is just uric acid, water, and ammonia, in a healthy person. None of
those things will do anything dramatic to start compost that water
wouldn't do on its own.

"tenacity" wrote in message
oups.com...
Why would urine be a better compost activator than anything else? Urine
is just uric acid, water, and ammonia, in a healthy person. None of
those things will do anything dramatic to start compost that water
wouldn't do on its own.


Apart from uric acid which is a useful form of nitrogen urine also contains
urea which is an even better source of nitrogen. In a warm aqueous solution
they are excellent compost activators.
Urine does not contain ammonia in a free form.
Most compost activators sold commercially contain similar things.