Chopping up Kitchen Waste for Compost

I have a lot of kitchen waste to compost and it's usually collected in a 30L Bin. I want to chop the waste up as small as I can and was thinking about emptying it into a wheelbarrow and chopping it with a spade.

Would doing that introduce any toxic metals or the like from the chopping action against the wheelbarrow? Perhaps a plastic barrel would be better. I have an old blue barrel, but would that release microplastics?

I know there are some Americans that use a drill and a paint mixer attachment to shred the material up. If I was to try this, would I have to get some kind of special food-safe bucket?

This is an American product that looks interesting but is not on sale anymore.

 

If its just vegetable waste I cant see why you cant chop it up anyway you want to really.
I think you are probably worrying too much about contamination.

Is this because you want to compost it yourself rather than have it collected.

 

Yes, it's all for adding to my compost pile but I'm trying to speed up decomposition as much as possible.

There's usually a large amount of it and would like to try get it as small as the guy in that video

 

If you can get the heap to warm up it will rot down fast enough, if it just stays cold all winter it will take longer, but if its just soft green kitchen waste I dont think chopping will make a massive difference.

 

I can't use a knife really as it would be about 30L of waste at a time. I do already try to chop things before I add to the bin but not everyone in the household does.

I guess it's not really necessary then.

Would chopping it into smaller pieces make any difference in how attractive it is to rats?

 

Are you rotting it down in the bin, or out in the open in the garden.
Often people use this kind of stuff for wormeries, not tried them myself .

 

It was a plastic bin which wasn't any barrier for them because they just chewed into the corners and eventually just tunneled under it.

I've built compost bays for pallets which aren't closed either, but at least now I can turn it over more and keep an eye on any activity better.

A rat ventured into the shed when the door was open to try get at the dog's bowl. I live in a rural area and am surrounded on all sides by farms so there's always some knocking around. I purchased a Fenn trap and in two weeks have killed 11 rats.

 

I chop any Veg waste as I go, it goes into a bucket with a lid outside the back door, when full it gets composted.
We have F & Chips delivered each Saturday, all the paper and card goes in the bin.

 

I wouldn't say I'm overrun with rats but it not unusual to find the odd dead one now and then, not much survives the local cat population around here.

 

We do the same. Getting my other half to smash up the eggshells is my issue!

 

Same here, I take maybe 2 bucketsfull a week to my allotment. My pile has rats most years during winter, it doesnt bother me much. They get disturbed when i turn the pile. although I've just dumped a load of seaweed into it so hopefully they don't like that. I do trap them if they venture into the shed or greenhouse though.

As for chopping, anything woody gets chopped to about 4 inches. If it's soft veg/fruit I don't bother

 

Kitchen waste/scraps, by definition, are usually already "chopped up" to a degree from the process of preparing the vegetables or whatever.

Further size reduction simply isn't necessary. Throw the scraps in your compostor and allow mother nature to do the rest. What's the rush?

The only item I'll further "prepare" are bunches of dead flowers. The long stalks can be annoying so I'll chop them down to more manageable lengths.