Are these fruit flies?

You're right that they won't hurt anything, but they sure can be annoying.

I've have good luck with sprinkling dried lavender blossoms on top of my compost. Lavender is a natural insect repellent, and it's just dried flowers, so it will decompose with the rest. I imagine this would work with other plants that act as insect repellents, too.

Of course, you'll need to get a bunch of lavender (or whatever) somewhere, if you don't normally keep it around. If you can't find a local source, I'm sure you can find it online.

Good luck.

Fruit flies and fungus gnats both are attracted to food scraps that aren't well buried in the pile and to piles that are too wet. Not a problem but bothersome. Bury the food scraps deeper and let the pile dry out some or add some more dry carbons and they will leave.

Dave

I wouldn't worry too much about the flies unless your neighbors are complaining. Once you are living there you can start a bin or larger pile which is easier to manage. You are to be commended for starting to compost even before you move!

Did you put holes in the bottom of the black plastic bag for drainage?

They're not a problem and not bothersome (for me).

thanks for all the great advise/words of wisdom

i'll try to get the kitchen scraps deeper

husband actually bought me two plastic composters
i just had the leaf mold in bags and poured it
into the composters

starting the pile has been on my mind for a few
months now, its hard in the RV, as my freezer is
tiny, but i'm usually at the property every few days
to check the mail, and i'm only about 10 miles away,
so its not too hard

the hardest part is NOT recycling

i just don't have the room to keep things 'till i
can get to the recycling center in tomball

but once on the property, i plan to get some trash
cans i can mark with "plastic", "cans", and "paper"
and begin my recycling in earnest

i sort of made a promis to earth mother, that if she
would help us get land, i promiss to recycle, but
here in the RV, its just not possible

tesa

Hi Tesa,

I think you're doing great! Everyone does what they can about recycling and living out of an RV has to be constraining. Are you building a new home?

I echo what everyone else said about the "flies". They are annoying but nothing to worry about.

Val

Keeping in mind that Fruit flies, Fungus Gnats, etc. larve need a pretty moist environment to hatch and grow the presence of these are an indication that the compost is too wet. Compost only needs to be just moist, not damp, not wet. Depending on the volume of compost 3 gallons of water may be too much. In 4 to 6 cubic feet too much while in 64 cubic feet just about enough.

well, we're not building the house yet,and in fact,
its a cabin, actually, but what we are doing is
building a "shed" type structure to pull the RV under

we designed it wide enough to actually open the slide
outs so we can live under it, as we're gonna harvest
rainwater, so we needed something with a roof, and since
the RV sould be better under cover, what with the sun
beatin' down on the roof, and such, we just killed two
birds

we bought a special roof that we can drink off, its special
plastic, somethin' or another, husband found it, expensive
as hell, but non toxic, also we had to buy stainless steel
screws, as galvanized will leach into our water, and let
me tell you, those screws were so expensive! 100 bucks
for 200 of the buggers!

but i'd rather spend more on the roof and less on the filters than the other way around, water filtering systems
can be very expensive too

the roofing material set us back a grand for a 15'x30'
"carport", but to dig a well would have been at least
three times that, if not more

we order our solar panels on monday, as we'll be 100% off
grid!

the solar kit, including all hardware, the panels, inverter
and such right at $3200, plus we bought an 8000 watt
generator

livin' the dream folks, livin' the dream

tesa

Thanks for the explanation, Tesa! Life's an adventure and you are living a special one. We had at one time hoped to get off grid also but haven't done so yet.

Maybe eventually you can build a garden shed which could be part retreat for yourself. That's what I'm planning even tho we now live in a house. Have also lived in a mobile at one time and we live in our RV when traveling so I understand small spaces. The one plus of small spaces is that housework occupies less time so you can garden more! :-)

Hope you keep us updated on your dream.

Tesa,

Even though it sounds a bit expensive, it sounds like a wonderful adventure! I'd love to get off the grid and be able to thumb my nose at the power company :-)

Val