Yes In My Back Yard
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Composters call for more time
The statewide rollout of a new four-bin system is creating a stir across Victoria, with many councils expressing concerns that the glass recycling system is unnecessary and costly. In Mount Alexander Shire, however, the issues with glass bins are secondary to the introduction of a FOGO (Food Organics Garden Organics) bin system, as local composters…
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Composting advocate hails rare opportunity
A leading Australian community composting advocate says Mount Alexander Shire has a rare opportunity to build on an already thriving grassroots movement rather than replacing it with a one-size-fits-all waste solution. Churchill Fellow and community composting researcher, Clytie Binder, visited Castlemaine last week to learn more about YIMBY (Yes In My Back Yard), the volunteer-run…
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Call to vote no to FOGO
Backyard composting group Yes In My Back Yard (YIMBY) submitted a petition with 1102 signatures to Mount Alexander Shire Council on Friday, asking councillors to vote no to rolling out Food Organics and Garden Organics (FOGO) bins in the shire. The bins are part of the state government’s four-bin initiative, introducing two new bins in…
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Composters call for delay on green bins
Local composting group YIMBY (Yes In My Back Yard) is calling on Mount Alexander Shire Council to delay the roll-out of a green bin service. The green ‘FOGO’ (Food Organics-Garden Organics) bin is designed to divert organic waste from landfill. Lucy Young from YIMBY said that while the group agreed with the council that it…
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Compost for a cause
What a start to the year it has been! Floods, fires and a local township severely impacted, with buildings, business, homes, gardens and bushland burned. YIMBY (Yes In My Back Yard) sends love to everyone who has been impacted and thanks to everyone who has helped out so far. We know there is so much…
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2025, a big composting year!
This year has been a big year for YIMBY community compost in Castlemaine and surrounds. We end the year with 43 composters, with 23 of those joining us just this year! These people are turning the food scraps of 573 households and 23 local businesses into wonderful rich compost in their backyards and helping improve…
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Dry grass and pea straw, not what you might think
With the fertility of spring drawing to a close and the dry of summer approaching, we often find ourselves with lots of dry grass to deal with. So, what role will it play in our compost? It is easy to think that if a compost ingredient is dry and brown, it must be on the…
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A more grounded kind of worm farm
Why keep our compost worms in a box when they are probably happier in the ground? In-Ground Worm Farms do just this, bringing our worms down into our gardens. The size and shape of IGWFs vary greatly, but they all share the same basic design. The top and access lid sit above garden level with…
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The 100th Compost Conversation
This week we celebrate 100 editions of the Compost Conversation! From the start, our aim has been to lift compost literacy and composting skills in this community. But, just how many backyard composters are we writing for out there? Back in early 2023, I was door-knocking around the West End of Castlemaine with a new…
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Tuck your worms in with a blanket
Compost worms really don’t like sunlight. When exposed to the sun they are likely to dry out and are also susceptible to getting picked up as breakfast by an early bird, so they do best to stay just below the surface of whatever they are feeding on. Understanding these worm vulnerabilities can help us operate…
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Bokashi – brilliant, or bit of a bother?
Do you know that feeling, everyone is talking about some ‘amazing’ thing, and you are left wondering “am I missing something here?”. That’s me and bokashi. Bokashi is a system for processing kitchen scraps that is presented as a convenient, odour-free alternative to composting or worm farming. We need a bokashi bucket – with a…
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Measuring our compost ingredients
When we first learn to cook, a recipe is our lifeboat, and we follow it to the letter. As we begin to trust our intuition, we need the recipe less and less, substituting an ingredient here, estimating a measure there, cooking more by feel than by the absolutes of cups or grams. Even when we…