My compost smells like rotting butt

seriously, rotting cabbaggy butt.

I just started it today and maybe my brassicas that i was going to compost sat too long in the transfer bucket and got to mushy. But OMG it is HORRIBLE.

My brown is straw so far and will be leaves as of tomorrow. The green is all kitchen scraps. There are so many flies and it is GROSS!!

HELP?!?

By the way, it is in a rotating compost barrel.

Eww ewww, gag, gag, vomit HELP!

seriously, rotting cabbaggy butt.

I dont know why your compost smells like butt.. but you kill me !!!
lolololol
Baby powder..Boudreaux's Butt Paste maybe? lololololololololol lol corn starch
Ha-v-v

I feel your pain, Hav-v-v! My cousin lives in Phelps, New York, right down the street from the local sauerkraut factory. Ain't nothin' like a mess of suppurating brassicas! Hope you get hold of enough leaves to compensate . . .

monkey butt powder from tractor supply hehehehe

Can I nominate this for "best title for a post" for the 2010 Weedys?

junequilt wrote:...Ain't nothin' like a mess of suppurating brassicas!...

I am really sorry I took the time to look up the meaning of suppurate.

ok I gotta know...exactly how much experience do you have in smelling rotten butt?

junequilt wrote:I feel your pain, Hav-v-v! My cousin lives in Phelps, New York, right down the street from the local sauerkraut factory.

Oh, wow, Junequilt. My high school was downwind (on bad days) of a paper mill. Talk about nasty!!! (Though I have to say that tidal sea inlet mud goo is right up there, too... stepping in that stuff is a very special olfactory experience.)

I second LaFee's suggestion!

@ Chocolatepop: On a more serious note, I am not sure what is wrong with your compost. You and many others on this website clearly know more about it than I do because I keep reading about green and brown and I have no idea what that means. My compost has never stunk unless I've just added a sank of manure to help it along. For kitchen scraps you should not add any meats, meat derivatives, cheese, or oils. I do not add any bread/pasta products or dairy, either. My general rule is I add scraps produced before cooking, not after.... unless all I did was steam a veggie.

My very uneducated-composter guess is that you've either got butyric acid (or something similar) from rotting meat/oil, or some hydrogen sulfide production. If it's the former, ditch the meat/oils you are adding, and if it's the latter, pop the top on your composter...it needs air. As far as I know, HS won't form in an aerobic environment. (Don't hang around while it airs out, either, that stuff is not good for you!)

"suppurating brassicas" - hmmm... sounds almost like a musical term.
And, believe me, it CAN be, if you eat them

I would try to remove the Brassicas that are making that awful smell. Toss them in the trash for the rubbish collection.

Along the same train of thought.... I would NEVER use cabbages, cauliflower, or broccoli in my compost bin. You can transfer clubroot (a disease) to your compost.
The best thing to do with Brassicas is to pull the whole plant out and trash it. Then add a handful of limestone to the hole from where they were pulled. I don't take a chance with them. Save yourself problems next year against the possibility of clubroot.

You guys are a riot !!

Thanks you guys, hey gotta keep you guys laughing right?

and YES I HAVE smelled rotten butt. A baby that was lactose intolerant with reflux as well as 500 adolescent high school boys AND, I forgot, living near a sugar beet processing plant...


The brassicas werent from the garden, they were from the market. I havent composted much from my garden cause I really havent harvested anything but a few potatoes, some radishes, and pulled all the peas. And IDK if I could handle going in that barrel and pulling out the brassicas. There is no meat, nothing but veggies, fruit and now hay. Oh and some egg shells, and some paper.


I nearly bleched just having to rotate it, and I have a VERY strong stomach. I'll go out tomorrow and add some more brown.

I'm thinking the compost transfer bucket was just to juicy when I dumped it and I have to wait for some other bacteria to do its job?

Do you by any chance have a source of sawdust from non-pressure treated lumber? That woud help balance out your over abundance of stinkin' greens.

I can ask around. I can go and get some corn pellet cat litter.

Would straw work for this purpose I wonder. We used to buy bales of straw for bedding for the goats, before I was a gardener and I know what good stuff that was coming out of the barn. But not sure how much you can store etc. I forget and offer advice from my bulk thought process A bale of straw could be used for mulch too ?
Let us know what you find to neutralize the "odor"
Ha-v-v

yup, straw is my primary brown. but I guess it can compact down too much too???

I have lots of straw from mulching and from my potatoes.

I was thinking straw would decompose faster than mine pine chips or sawdust? Thats why I thought maybe it would help the rotting butt syndrome !! I so know about them diapers !!!
Ha-v-v

Its a great idea

I just found a pile of old clippings and some dried bean vines that I threw aside. It already smells better!! Well, as good as cabbage rear can smell.

Maybe some shredded paper, limestone or wood ash? I think maybe it needs to dry out a bit.

LOL. My answer would be TIME. Walk away from the compost pile. Don't hang out there. Compost happens.

Keep adding browns and let it air out some. I have more problems balancing my browns and greens in my tumblers than my heaps. The heaps are just so much more forgiving and actually end up smelling less. The smell is usually fairly contained inside the bins, but when you open it, "Woop, there it is!"

I certainly would not try to remove the cabbage butts. I, too, have a VERY strong stomach, but would not even consider that. It will be nothing but slime and goo. Just "dilute" it with browns, turn, turn, turn and air it out for a while if you can without getting a nuisance ticket . It will sort itself out. If it's too horrendously smelly after several days of turning, add more browns and turn some more.

Good luck!

I certainly would not try to remove the cabbage butts. I, too, have
a VERY strong stomach, but would not even consider that. It will be
nothing but slime and goo. Just "dilute" it with browns, turn, turn,
turn and air it out for a while if you can without getting a nuisance
ticket

I seem to think in song lyrics or movie dialogue, so with this post and the instructions to turn turn turn that pile of cabbage butts, I thought this song was appropriate :-D I like it. It could speak about our gardens, a time to grow, a time to die:) a time to turn turn turn .
Turn Turn Turn by the Byrds

:-D Happy Gardening
Ha-v-v

Ha-v-v wrote:

I certainly would not try to remove the cabbage butts. I, too, have
a VERY strong stomach, but would not even consider that. It will be
nothing but slime and goo. Just "dilute" it with browns, turn, turn,
turn and air it out for a while if you can without getting a nuisance
ticket

I seem to think in song lyrics or movie dialogue, so with this post and the instructions to turn turn turn that pile of cabbage butts, I thought this song was appropriate :-D I like it. It could speak about our gardens, a time to grow, a time to die:) a time to turn turn turn .
Turn Turn Turn by the Byrds

:-D Happy Gardening
Ha-v-v

I love that song, maybe I was channeling!

I love that song, maybe I was channeling!

Its a good song thought it was relevant to the gardening I like it a lot
Ha-v-v