SLOP BUCKETS

I tried using the food waste bin briefly last summer. Compostables are composted so not a lot of food waste here. The first week some meat bones had split the lining so the bin men wouldn't take it, the second week I wrapped the crawling mess in a carrier bag and they wouldn't take that because it was not compostable. The third week I gave up,put it into a black sack and put it into the ordinary rubbish bin. Have not bothered again.
Tegan I had a bit of a rodent problem in the compost heap too, so I got some pink rodent killing blocks from the hardware shop. Put those on top of the compost and closed the lid to keep cats out. The pink blocks disappeared within a couple of days and have had no problems since.

I should really have said food waste bin but I couldn't think of it when I posted this. Slop bucket doesn't really sound very nice. I also have to admit that my food waste bin has disappeared some while ago into the bowels of our garage. I'm too wuss to ring up the council and tell them it's been mislaid in case I go on a blacklist of dissenters "to be educated on the benefits of the food waste bin and why we should use them!"

We have 5 bins. One for recycling, one for garden waste, a little brown caddy for food inside which is a slop bucket (yuk) and a black bin for what the council describe as 'anything else'. You are supposed to keep the slop bucket inside, line it with bio degradable (or whatever the term is) bags and then put these into the caddy outside for the bin men to collect. Are you with me so far? I got myself in a complete pickle when we first had all these bins but it's surprising how you get used to it. I can't have that horrible slop bucket in my kitchen so I keep it in our little utility room and wash it out regularly. All these bins at the front of the house look horrible but we have nowhere else to keep them - three large wheeley bins and a brown caddy.

I have space at the front for 3 large wheely bins and they would make an excellent "step up" for a burglar. All that one can see here are wheely bins everyhwere. They are all neatly placed, just in my opinion an eyesore.

Same here Charleygirl, I agree.

Every now and again I think of all the jobs I now do that used to previously be done by other people: sorting the recycling, supermarket check-out, travel agent (trains and boats and planes), hotel reviewer, weather "girl" reports, bank clerk ... the list is endless I'm a one woman wizard of everything. No wonder I sometimes think "Well, I ain't doing that one no more".

Apologies bit "off piste" .

I vaguely remember my Gran having a slop bucket, but don't know what she put in it.
My Mum used to put any wettish food waste down the toilet, and I do that too.
Our chickens, dogs, cats get more solid food waste, but there isn't much of it. Veg peelings etc go on the compost heap.
As we have to transport our own rubbish to different places (in rural France) we try to have as little of it as possible.

When I hear the term SLOP BUCKET, I think of those pails that used to be taken round the bedrooms years[so I have heard] to empty the CHAMBER POTS into.

Our council don't provide the liners

Neither does mine. And they even check how many newspapers have been used [one sheet only allowed, I believe]. And those compostable bags aren't cheap.

Like you Tricia between the dogs and the chickens and the compost heap we have no leftovers to put in a slop bin.

I've been avoiding this thread because I thought it was about the type of 'slop bucket' so neatly described by Nonu above

Sounds a bit like the pig bins we had after the war - I can remember the smell

Our council don't provide the liners either Galen and they're not cheap.

Marelli sorry to disagree but our Council tells us that Clackmannanshire has the highest recycling rate in the whole of Britain. We are also told that the 'Wee Coonty' was the first to extend recycling from the glass collection bins which we have had for yonks for the big Glass Works in Alloa, to first paper, then plastic, tins, clothing and garden waste. I know that the garden waste is shredded, left to weather and available free to all local residents for garden compost (bring your own bags). Not sure what they do with kitchen waste - perhaps fuel for the incinerator which powers crushers, etc. at the spotlessly clean and tidy recycling centre.

Slop bucket used to mean something quite different, in the days of outside loos and jerries under the bed! And those earlier prisons where the cells had no lavs, used to 'slop out' on a morning. It makes your nose hurt to think about it.

As for food waste, we have chickens, a dog and a compost bin, so the only things that go in the council bin are well wrapped bones.

The only slop bucket I have ever used was very hard on the backs of the legs. And you had to be very careful to balance properly so as to not tip it over. And put the newspaper cover back afterwards.

Ah, GN can bring back the best of memories.

We have 4 large wheelie bins. Today's collection is for garden and food waste, paper and glass. Next week, it's waste that isn't recyclable. The council provides biodegradable bags for food waste. The bags fit our under the sink compost bin, and then go straight into the green wheelie bin. Since reading about the fat balls forming in the sewers, I no longer pour anything in that category down the sink. When the green food waste bins were introduced, there was a bit of an outcry locally, concerns we'd be over run with rats. That hasn't happened. I do hope the food waste is used for compost at some central point.

We have a badger family. They and their young recycle all food waste. They have a sweet tooth and eat fallen plums, apples and blackberries .

Slop bucket is not a nice term, Joan is right, that is what it always meant.

Ours is a 'food waste bin' or 'food recycling bin' to give it its official title.

We scraped our leftovers from dinner into a 'pig bin' at school.

When I was in my early teens, I helped out on a pig farm Ana. We lived in a sea side town, and we'd collect the left over food from all the B&B's, slop it into bins, horse driven cart, and make our way back to the pig farm. Pigs loved the food, friendly creatures, except one, so grumpy she lived in isolation. On reflection maybe that added to her grumpy demeanour. It's a pity it's no longer safe to feed slops to pigs, it's a pity pigs no longer live outside, with shelters, as ours did. Still, that's progress init.

My DM worked at a very posh hotel when I was younger; she was horrified to see trifles and other lovely puds as well as other good food going into the pig swill simply because they had not been eaten by guests, not that they were off.

She used to say that the local pigs were the best fed in the country.

Well, bacon and pork certainly tasted better in those days!

Must have been the sherry in the trifles!

The sherry may have helped - but the main difference was that pigs lives, well like pigs. Ours had plenty of room to snuffle and wander through the trees, and shared pig runs, where they were not overcrowded.

Pigs just aren't meant to live their lives unable to moved, unable to develop muscle, or mix with their piggy pals. I appreciate that farmers have to make a living, and work very hard but I dislike intensive factory farming - a lot.