What do you do with your trash?

[TheMrs]

OK, this may be a really stupid question, but I'm honestly interested in your answers. We're moving from a home that has weekly trash pickup. Apparently there is county trash pick-up available at our new property, but we would rather save that expense and take care of our trash ourselves. We already recycle newspaper, plastics, cans, and cardboard. We compost fruit and veggie scraps, eggshells, coffee, etc. I know we can burn paper products at our new place too. However, I do still wonder what you all do with the other "stuff."

What do you do with dead batteries, small appliances that break..that kind of stuff? Thanks for helping me figure out all these new aspects of homesteading!

[meanwhile]

Paper: gets composted or used as mulch, kindling....under layer in dog yard....and if there is really any left over it goes in main Burn Pile

Compost: anything that will rot goes in one of 3 compost areas

Metal: anything metal goes in a pile for a neighbor who picks it up and sells it at scrap yard....he will take old appliances...even small ones....

Other: anything that no one wants we have in a pile for the Dump.....but....having said that we have not been to the Dump but one time in the past 3 years! Usually someone can use whatever we have.

Plastic: milk jugs are used to freeze water for "back up" in the freezer (we take them out as we add food but put them back when there is a blank spot)......or we use them to root plants...or as paint cups.....if they are really torn up and reached the point of no return, they go on Dump Pile.....

Start up a "pile" area that is out of sight but where you can reach it to cart it off later. You could get some old pallets and set them upright....and then pile up stuff in between them. We have several "piles"....one is for metal and a neighbor gets in it from time to time and takes what he wants.....the other is pure "trash" like plastic....another is anything with a motor or parts.......and the kids get in there and so projects or neighbors come fetch what they might need.....

Start some piles and you will figure out what you need to really trash and what might come in handy later.

Be sure it is Safe tho......no broken glass mess or sharp metal for someone to get hurt...or dogs or if you have kids around.......just be safe.

good luck

[RiverPines]

We take the trash to the dump. We take a trip about once every 3 months. I dont like to have piles of garbage and junk laying around.

Our dump takes a lot of things like TV's and used oil and they send it to recycle places but we have to pay extra for that in addition to the per pound pay. Thats the only way its done here. We dont have a recycle center that takes anything other than plastic and paper and glass. All the rest the dump sorts out.

Its not a dump where you just dump your trash in the landfill. It unloaded from your truck/trailer in a facility and sorted. They dont allow non-trash in the actual landfill.

[Ohiogal]

I burn all paper products in an ash can outside the house.
I recycle all metal and glass products - cans get rinsed out and separated and sold based on metal type. Glass is taken to a single-stream recycling center.
As is plastic.
Recycle the rest - and the little bit of "wet" garbage I create is burned too.
The only thing I can't seem to find a good disposal for is old cat litter.
It helps to buy only simply packaged stuff, and compost as much as you can.

[countrydreamn]

the garbage truck takes it weekly as we can not opt out of this, $14.00 a month that I would much rather spend else where.

[Fae]

Weekly pickup by garbage truck. You have to pay for it whether you use it or not.

[Curtis B]

If you have a scrap yard near, most will take the dead batteries, and they will even pay for them. I also haul the scrap steel in, for money. The rest is pretty much the same as the others.

[Bonnie L]

We recycle/compost/burn whatever we can. Anything left over goes in feed bags, which eventually gets taken to the dump. This happens once or twice a year.

[Ken Scharabok]

People don't belive me when I say I generate, at most, two plastic trash bags of household garbage a year. The rest gets recycled in some manner. We have county recycling centers which accept: paper, recyclable (sp?) plastics (water, soda and milk mostly), broken apart cardboard and metal (including electronic equipment and applicances).

They do not recycle glass. Here I have a 5-gallon plastic bucket out in the shop. Glass goes into it to be broken by via a large sledge hammer head dropping on it. When bucket is about 2/3rds full it goes to the trash bin. It may not reduce weight, but it sure reduces volume. Maybe one bucket a year to center. (I'd kind of like to see a law bottled foodstuffs, where feasible - e.g., olives and pickles - are sold in either pint or quart canning jars. I have a friend who lived in Israel for several years. She said most liquids are sold in standard two-liter glass bottles which are then turned in for the deposit.)

Empty egg cartons go to a local who sells farm-fresh eggs.

On fresh meat or produce I wash the styrofoam trays and break or cut them up into small pieces for packaging cushioning.

By the time I throw away a piece of clothing it is beyond repair, even with iron-on patches. Here, if I had a compost pile, it would go into it.

Meat scraps and bones and vegetable trimmings get tossed out into the backyard. They disappear within 2-3 days.

Used kitchen grease is put into a glass jar. When full it is capped and goes into trash. However, here again, if I had a compost pile it would go there.

(A sister and BIL retired from FL up here to TN and live across the ridge from me. He is now into composting so the cattle manure I pick up in the yard after using them as lawnmowers goes over there.)

I admit I am somewhat of a large jug wino. When enough empties accumulate I sell them on eBay to folks who make their own.

I have, in the past, sold fresh cattle manure on eBay as the base for manure tea for houseplants. Effort to do so become greater than the sales price. But, sent in a 5-gallon plastic bucket with lid...

And I'm really not a recycling fanatic. Old saying: 80% of results come from the first 20% of effort.

[Ravenlost]

Originally Posted by Ohiogal

I burn all paper products in an ash can outside the house.
I recycle all metal and glass products - cans get rinsed out and separated and sold based on metal type. Glass is taken to a single-stream recycling center.
As is plastic.
Recycle the rest - and the little bit of "wet" garbage I create is burned too.
The only thing I can't seem to find a good disposal for is old cat litter.
It helps to buy only simply packaged stuff, and compost as much as you can.

We put our cat litter in potholes that develop in our driveway. However, our driveway is a half mile long!

I recycle what I can (which isn't enough...no glass or plastic recycling here) and the rest is picked up via weekly county service. However, we usually get by with only putting garbage in the can once or twice a month.

[Mrs. Homesteader]

We burn the paper and burnable trash. We recycle plastic, glass and metal. Our township brings in a trash truck every other month on the first Saturday. Anything else goes in a can and goes there. We usually have one can. It is $1 a can or large trash bag.

[norcalfarm]

We don't have it down to a science, as some of the above people do. After recycling everything that can be recycled, we generate about one bag of garbage a week. We either make a dump run when necessary or I will occasionally take a bag to my families house just down the road.

We tried shredding our paper products and using them in our chicken coop in place of pine chips. I question the ink from the paper going to my compost pile and then to my garden. Also, the paper shreds end up all over my yard. Now we just burn paper in our woodstove.

We compost everything that the chickens, turkeys, goats, and dogs won't eat.

[ibcnya]

I burn it and what is leftover gets buried in the back forty. That is what I was taught anyway.

[Minelson]

Anything that won't burn I take to work with me once a week for the garbage pickup. I usually have one large black bag full

[Wolf mom]

I feel so blessed.

I used to take a couple white bags a week to a townie friend & use her trash bin. A friend recently delivered a 30" rolloff so I can really clean up everything I can't burn, recycle or compost. He'll cart it off to the dump when full at no charge to me.

[ErinP]

burn barrel.

There is no rural garbage service.
For that matter, a lot of folks in town have a burn barrel, too.

[lmrose]

Where I live recyling is a big thing. About five years ago trash pickup started in the country as well as town. It is added to our property tax so we pay for it whether we use it or not.
Every second week is trash day. That is for whatever will fit in a garbage bag except those things which have to be recycled or compostable. Garbage goes in clear bags and we are allowed one dark bag for private garbage whatever that means?
Bottles and cans go in a blue bag to be recycled and must be washed and dried first. The county gives everyone a green cart which is as big as a rain barrel for compostables.

Tvs, all electronics,paint, batteries have to be taken to a depot in town. They will pick them up if you can't get there.

Then once in the Spring and once in the Fall is clean up day. Fridgs, stoves, furniyure, fencing etc can be put out on the side of the road and picked up.

Our selves don't make much garbage. The blue bag with recylables may get put out once every other month. All compostables go in our compost pile or to the animals for feed. The dark garbage bag might go out once a month if that. The clear ones hardly ever.

Before we had pickup there was a dump but we hardly ever went there. If you live where there is no pickup for garbage and not near a dump like we once did there are alternatives.
Burn all paper, cardboard; smash glass into very small pieces and bury it deep in an out of way place. Compost everything you can to use on the garden.
Old clothes can be used for rags and what isn't good burned. Appliances have to hauled away and preferably by a junk dealer who has a way to do so.

I used to try to avoid buying food in tin cans when there was no way to get rid of them. What people here used to do was pick a spot on the farm and flatten cans and bury them. Now burning trash and home "dumps" are illegal here.

We try to make as little garbage as we can. Try to re use what ever possible and then use the service provided.

[Ken Scharabok]

For about the last 25 or so years the printing ink used in the U.S. is soybean oil based. B&W newspaper should be fine. The slick paper colored ads? More so for their compostability than the ink in them.

Remember seeing a program in which a dairy in England mixed old newspaper with the cattle feed for its bulk.

I have a friend in WV who drives truck for a company which recycles newspapers and such. It comes out in mats about 1/8" x 4' x 4' and a grey in color (think paper egg cartons which are made out of recycled newspaper). It goes to another company which bleaches out the ink and turns it into newspaper print rolls, copy paper, etc. Usually it is mixed with some percentage of new material.

An experiment to try yourself. Tear up some B&W newspaper and put it in a blender on puree setting. Pour out on a piece of window screen, spread out thinly and evenly and let dry. Can be used for arts & crafts and such.

[norcalfarm]

I know in California, burning any garbage is illegal. I believe that most states have similar laws, not to mention that burning plastics, oils etc are very environmentally unfriendly. I'm not the greenest person but I definitely wouldn't do it.

[ergoman]

you can burn garbage in most if not all of the country other than kaliforinia, petrol based items shouldnt be burned obviously.