compost rubbish!

Hi Mark, From what I've read and what people are saying here, cardboard sounds like it's good for compost. Maybe the compost you bought wasn't left for long enough? I've certainly been putting paper and cardboard in my compost bin.

Maybe i was unlucky and purchased some poor quality bags. Hopefully it was a one off.
Thanks for the comment.

Hi Mark, i have just recently started composting myself so have done quite a lot of research about it, and yes i agree with peter cardboard and paper absolutely essentual for composting, i think what peter said is right it proberly was'nt left long enough. if you pay to have all of your garden waist collected and you also pay to buy new compost, why don't you cut out the middle man save yourself some cash and make your own - it's really easy to do, once you have bought the composters - which are quite cheap to buy you don't really have to spend anymore money - i have two, one which i bought from the council cost me £8 and another that i bought from ebay which cost me £12 - the one from the council also come with loads of info about how to do it.

Compost properly made, mixed and 'cooked' can definitely have some torn up cardboard in, and shredded paper too. I really can't imagine what.your Council has done (or not done) to its compost that you've had recognisable cardboard in it. I seriously think that you should complain to them, Mark. Majeeka is right, why aren't you composting youself? It's easy, honestly - also Eco-friendly, of course.

I cant remember who warned me but I believe that cardboard can be held together wiht some pretty toxic glues so I am reluctant to compost too much of it. Just set fire to a card board box and you can see that there is something more than natural material burning. There may be regulations but I with so much stuff coming from China who knows what is used? Fred

I have added cardboard and shredded paper to my compost for a long time now, my compost is rich and smells sweet, my garden seems very happy to have this spread on it. I think you should complain to the council, obviously the compost wasn't ready for sale and should be allowed to break down further before it is sold for garden use. I also agree, why are you not making some of your own you only need a small corner of your garden. I wouldn't give all my garden waste to my council only to buy it back from them.

I too compost paper and cardboard in my vegetable waste. I have 2 bins, each about 1 meter cubed, and whilst one is being filled the other is "fermenting". I use the compost produced mainly as a mulch but this year I sieved some and mixed it with a proprietary peatless compost and made some wonderful potting compost for my tomatoes and fuchsia's. Our council uses the 2 bin system for rubbish collection, the black bin for domestic rubbish and the brown bin for garden waste. Paper, plastic, glass bottles and cans are collected separately. I add only brown cardboard to the heap, the rest I leave for the council. The only garden vegetable waste I put in the brown bin is the roots of the pernicious weeds (dandelion, dock, twitch etc) the rest is composted. Woody waste I run through the shredder / chipper, the wood chips add valuable dry material to the mushy green stuff, as does the card and paper. Leaves at this time of year go on the leaf heap to rot down to make leaf mould. It's a great way of getting rid of confidential waste paper.
My compost is, like Holly's, rich and smells sweet and is stuffed full of worms, luvly jubbly!

Is it o.k. to add rhubarb leaves to the compost bin?

I would have thought so, but i would be guessing.
You might like to ask this in the Questions section of Grows on you, i'm sure someone can answer accurately.