Nothing Smells Rotten in Leslie B. Vosshall’s Compost Pail

For 6 years we used red wigglers to Compost in in our NYC apartment on 21st floor. "Composting in Manhattan," a performance form, led to "This Dirt Museum," an installation at Queens Botanical Garden in 2001. Impressed that the City has moved ahead with compost program, like to think I was in the ground floor.

Up here in Vermont we are lucky enough to have a big ol' pile of compost outside, not too close to the house. I just dump my kitchen bin right in, once or twice a week and I barely need to do anything else before I dig beneath it to get some dark earthy gold when the time comes to plant the garden in spring. Though the kitchen canister will often smell, the big pile outside does not and, to my surprise, though we have plenty of bears walking around the property, they never seem interested in the pile, my guess is all the coffee grounds. Perhaps they tried it once and did not like the caffeinated feeling. Three cheers for composting, it's really rewarding.

Well, its a known fact that humans can adapt to any smell over a long period of time until the brain forgets it, I've worked preparing small sharks (bad reputation for being very smelly) in a lab for later dissecting by students and before that I used to get all my furniture from the rubbish garbage dump and it was no problem adapting. Also, some mens' aversion to womans' menstrual cycle, as evident with the new laws passed in India that now allows previously banned women with the period to go into the temple, goes to show how ill founded the basis for phobias with smells is.

Hi Lovely NYT Readers:
For those of you who asked about where I got my beloved compost bucket, it costs $25 and is available on Amazon (Epica Stainless Steel Compost Bin 1 Gallon http://smile.amazon.com/dp/B00AMNCYNQ)
I agree that an empty bucket with a lid (kitty litter or joint compound or even take-out soup container), works just as well.

XO America's Worst Chef

Here on the L E S we don't need the pricey looking stainless steel container . I use a repurposed 1 gallon joint compound bucket with lid. Once full , or close to it , it goes up to the roof and into a large plastic trash bin with holes drilled in the sides and bottom . When that gets filled , a couple of times a year , I dump it onto a tarp for further decomposition and mixing. It eventually ends up in one of the many planters that form the rooftop garden and birdbath . I love science too.

Nice article with just the right amount of humor (except for the food waste ...). For ten years now have been porting our compost (family of 5-7 persons and lots of cooking) from our apartment in Rome to our 10 acre olive farm in Umbria. Started with the same Crate and Barrel bucket as Ms. Vosshall but soon changed to an Ikea mid-size trash can. Can't say the odors are always the most pleasant (hadn't thought of a worm system) but it gives a steady supply of organic material for the sandy, clayey soil in our garden.

I have always wanted to try my hand in composting. Couple of days ago, I finally got myself a compost bin that I've started to put to use rightaway. Luckily for me at least, my town has started a compost project, with some big bins that I can drop off, should my bin get filled in. I'm getting very giddy that so much of my garbage bin waste is going to be put to good use.

As a person with a very keen sense of smell I often find it challenging to attend events when seated near someone wearing perfume. It gives me a headache and detracts from my enjoyment of the performance. So for me and countless others out there with these sensitivities, others' perfume is nothing to celebrate. Please be considerate of others and leave your chosen scent bottled up at home.

I religiously compost all vegetable and fruit leftovers. Fortunately I have a garden to apply it to...have a large composter for grass clippings that I can rotate. For the fruit and vegetable matter, I dig a deep hole in the borders
And dump it in before it is composed and allow it to compose in the ground. No smell, no animals, just makes good soil.. I use a 3 lb. coffee container to collect the wastes. In the winter I store these containers in
My large freezer and defrost in the spring when I can dig in the garden and add it then..and with recycling, paper, plastic and metal have practically no garbage at all to be collected. Yes, have had volunteer tomato plants which were superior to the purchase ones..

My daughter and I have been fooling around with a vermiculture composter planter all winter and now have three extremely robust volunteer tomato plants. Intentional seeds of eggplant and pepper will go into another v-planter next week for spring planting. I can't wait to see how the vermiculture starts do compared to traditionally-started seeds. I'm betting I'll have the best garden ever.

I'm happy some New Yorkers are finally finding a compost bucket useful. That some folks still think composting is somehow smelly is hilarious. I don't know of a kitchen here that doesn't have a compost bucket - expect for my Mom's bless her heart. In Oregon where we have been composting for decades, I offer some improvement to be reported system. First uneaten human food is fed to the dog. And if not fit for the dog then to the chickens. Understand the our city chickens are spoiled, as they should be, so they to turn up their beaks are some offerings. Those items then go to the red worms in the worm bin. The worm castings then go to the garden. No food is ever wasted. Making a light joke out of dumping poorly cooked food into a compost bin is sad and demonstrates a tangible detachment from the hard labor that created it. This article should be rewritten to show some reverence to one of our fundamental needs.

Thank you for an enjoyable article about an interesting and entertaining person. As fellow commenter "throughhiker" mentions, I particularly identify with Dr Vosshall's remark that scientists aren't humorless, dour people, but bohemians. She's describing my wife who trained as a scientist and the colleagues she worked with in labs.

I'd like to add a note about composting:

I completed a course offered by the NY Botanical Garden, earning certification as a Master Composter. I've volunteered in urban composting education, including at the NY Dept of Sanitation's former composting facility in Soundview, and have continued my education in this subject.

If the composting pail in your kitchen has even the faintest aroma of rot, you're simply not doing the simple things you can do to manufacture compost -- which is a specific product resulting from the controlled decomposition of organic matter, whether that is food waste, garden waste or even old newspapers.

Compost smells like the forest floor.

Compost and its liquid runoff, humic acid, both of which occur in nature, are the world's greatest soil amendments. A little goes a long way. Many sites offer simple instructions for succeeding in this simple process (simple at the small scale), including a wealth of videos on sites such as YouTube.

"Every fertile grain of soil has passed at least once through the gut of an earthworm." Charles Darwin.

Or through the pail of an urban composter. And it's easy.

I think you'll enjoy having a vermicomposting bin. You can get some nice-looking ones that blend in with the furniture, perhaps sitting in a corner next to a tall vase or under a console or sofa table. When worm composting is done right--which is very easy to do--there is no smell. When I lived in an apartment, my vermicomposting bin was in the dining room, next to an antique Tibetan chest. No one ever noticed it until I asked them if they'd like to meet my worms.

They say if a pond is too clean waterlilies won't grow. I could fill that tiny compost bin almost every day...my compost heap is a fenced-around hole about 3' around...thankfully outside.

Great article. Thank you to the NYT for not including a picture of Cuddles.

Charming. I love where she says, "People think scientists are humorless, dour people. We're bohemian." I find that's so true. The scientists I know are all also painters or musicians......or quirky composters. They are playful.

That is a great-looking compost bucket. What is it?? It's challenging to find something for the average urban kitchen that encourages scraps to break down in an odorless way. Any product recommendations would be welcome.

WONDERFUL!! Hooray for this woman! I've had it up to here with people who are overly clean zealots who freak out when you serve something with an expiration date that is one day overdue; they are the same ones who are horrified, just horrified, when there is a speck of food on their newly-washed silverware. Hooray for realists who embrace living in this messy world of ours!

Great! I toyed with the idea of owning a tarantula. Pet name: Tarantula Gargantua.