composting while traveling?

[jrabbit]

We are planning to be full time RVing within the next few months - our third major family trip next week.  I am a planner, mentally hashing out each obstacle along the way.  

One big issue for us is reducing our footprint and earthly impact.  In our stick house, we compost almost every scrap.  Recycling on the road is easy, but the food waste issue is really messing with my brain.  I've been composting for over 25 years, and my parents still do.  It is just the WAY.  On our last trip, I did discard some food scraps along the way ... ummm ... along the road ... very carefully and thoughtfully ... and we froze what we could when we were close to our ultimate destinations, but I still had to throw away a bunch of egg shells and citrus peels, etc.  It was intensely painful for me to throw that organic matter in a trash can!!  I know, I'm weird, but it's ingrained in my brain.  (Oh, and we also have pet rabbits, and it would probably send me over the edge to throw away their litterbox contents!)

So, I've been trying to figure out a way to have a worm bin, but that will present its own challenges.  We won't be able to control the temperature 100%, even though our ideal goal is to stick to moderate climate zones during the winter and summer.  We won't be able to devote a lot of weight or space to this, either.  But, I can manage to find space for a DIY bin of stacked rubbermaid totes, I'm pretty sure.  

But others who have done it are suggesting that I shouldn't attempt to travel with a worm bin because they are too fragile.  

So, any other suggestions?  Has anyone tried an electric under-counter composter?  kinda pricey, but if it was worth it ... I would trade my sewing machine for compost, maybe!

(http://www.compostbins.com/kitchen-composters/nature-mill/12177+4295105382+4295062736.cfm?source=googleaw&kwid=electric%20compost%20maker&tid=exact&gclid=CPG7_qXNxK0CFTOCtgodrRLoxA)

--janis

[Contrariety]

you could look into bokashi.  i think the set up in similar to worms but it's basically fermenting the compost with friendly bacteria, as I understand it.  haven't ever done it myself, but i've casually looked into for winter composting.

[MaJoie]

Do your bunnies travel with you? How do you manage that? I really understand about not wanting to trash their litter. I cringe when I'm visiting other folks who just dump their scraps into the trash or garbage disposer. We make dog soup with meat scraps and bits of gristle, skin and stuff we don't eat. It gives them more flavor and nutrition mixed into their kibble. PP does the bokashi system reduce the volume enough to make it practical on the road? It seems expensive especially if you have to keep buying the microbes.

[Contrariety]

I think you can DIY with wild microbes, but I've never done it myself so I'm not 100% sure.

[laohaire]

Unless you really want to keep the end result for yourself, I'd be tempted to blend it up and deposit on or just under the ground. I'd pick deposit places where the fertility was least likely to be lost - say, a forested or grassy area rather than a sandy area.

[jrabbit]

Just thought I'd poke my head in here and tell about my worm bin.  We didn't do anything til March.  I started out really small, and it turned out to be tooooo small for us.  I was still having to find other solutions for our scraps and the bunny boxes.  

Finally, our worms finally started reproducing and eating a little.  But now we are going to California and Oregon, where they have real strict border crossings regarding bugs.  We bought new worms and have started over with an indoor bin.  Crossing fingers!

I wrote about the experiences in our blog:

http://pjamz5.wordpress.com/2012/05/20/worms/

Oh, and we still fully expect to find "other solutions" most of the time.  I'm not in it for the end results, just to make good choices with the biodegradable materials in our life.  We strive to be as close to zero waste as we can.