These will run you $60 to $150, or you can make a DIY for $20. To get started you need a special bokashi bucket that has a tight lid, and a spigot at the bottom to drain off liquids (pictured above). What is Bokashi composting? The rough translation is ‘the fermentation of organic materials’, which is pretty broad.From we have the following description “Bokashi composting is a safe, convenient, and quick way to compost food waste in your kitchen, garage, or apartment.” With this broad definition of Bokashi we can liken it to a basic fermentation recipe. So in that way, you can think of this as a guide to fermentation. I like the Bokashi buzzword, it sounds cool, but don’t feel like you’re limited to fermenting kitchen scraps in your “Bokashi Bin” (aka fermentation bucket – sounds way less cool). It’s important to note – Bokashi composting doesn’t break things down the way traditional aerobic composting does. You won’t get a pile of dirt from your kitchen scraps, fish, bones or whatever you’re composting this way. You will simply have the same material, looking a little more monochrome, more easily broken/separated/smushed when you squeeze it, and smelling sour.
BUT, this material, in the next stage of decomposition, will break down much faster and more completely than it would otherwise. So Bokashi composting, under the broad definition above, is far from just pre-composting kitchen scraps bound for the traditional compost heap. It is a valuable tool we can use to boost the decomposition rate or digestibility of a nutrient source. Just like in the anaerobic compost tea, we aren’t worried about overloading the system with nutrients.
You don’t need it to heat up, so you don’t have to monitor the ingredients to get just the right balance of greens and browns. It won’t heat up like a traditional compost pile, so it won’t get too hot if you put in all green nutrients. Just like comparing aerobic vs anaerobic compost teas, we can compare bokashi composting to traditional composting. In bokashi, a little more limited group of beneficial anaerobes break down an unlimited amount of nutrients into more plant available forms.Īerobic composting produces a wide variety of beneficial aerobic microbes which break down a limited amount of nutrients into plant available forms. The breakdown process doesn’t go as far as traditional composting, but it still makes a much more bioavailable nutrient source for whatever your need – plants, animals or people. In fact depending on the need we will use only nutrients in the system. In this way you can break down a ton of material safely and without smell. You can’t just put your kitchen scraps in the compost heap every day. You will likely end up with a wet, sloppy, stinky mess that will harm the garden rather than help. So instead, you’ll use bokashi to break down the material scentlessly and safely before adding it to the garden or compost bin. If you want to make your animal feed much more effective, increase the growth rate of your animals, you’ll use bokashi to pre-digest their feed. Or maybe a batch of animal feed got wet and will spoil or has already started to spoil. Bokashi! A ton of green waste and no brown waste to balance it out? Bokashi! After fermenting, you can add the waste to the garden where it will quickly break down and feed the soil. There are a myriad applications of this valuable technique.Īs mentioned above, you can ferment anything organic – food, paper, bones, sticks, coffee grounds, moss, leaves, animal waste, bird feathers, etc etc. It just involves adding an energy source (sugar most commonly), the right microbes, proper moisture level, and keeping the system anaerobic (no oxygen).
The simple energy source should be simple carbohydrates – sugar, syrup, molasses, honey, jaggery, etc. The generally accepted best source is molasses, because of all the vitamins and minerals it contains. In any case, the simple carbohydrate source is the basic feed of the anaerobic bacteria that you’ll use to ferment the solids in your system. You can use up to 1/3rd part sugar in terms of solids. For example, you might have 30kg of solids to ferment, you would add 10kg sugar max. You can use less sugar, and the fermentation will not proceed as far along since there is less food source. You can also diversify the feeds by adding other energy sources – fruits which contain sugar, etc. My personal guideline with sugar is – the more biologically active the ingredients, the more sugar to be used. The abundance of food helps beneficial fermentation bacteria dominate. For example I would add more sugar when fermenting bird feathers or fish than I would coffee grounds or fresh cut leaves.
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