Oh, Rats! How to Avoid Rodents at Community Composting Sites

Contrary to popular belief, composting in cities does not cause rodent problems. In fact, composting food scraps, instead of dumping them in the trash, has the power to mitigate rodent pressures in urban neighborhoods.

Oh, Rats! How to Avoid Rodents at Community Composting Sites is designed to support composters at community gardens, schools, urban farms, and other community venues in successfully managing their composting process to avoid rodents. Much of the information in the guide applies regardless of the composting system in place.

Understanding rodent diet, behavior, and burrowing activity can help community composters avoid creating habitats for them. By supporting well-managed local composting sites, communities can take immediate action in cleaning up their neighborhoods, reducing their waste, and improving their soils.

Many thanks to the NRDC Food Matters Program and our other funders for supporting the creation of this guide.

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Oh, Rats!: How to Avoid Rodents at Community Composting Sites features custom graphics created by ILSR’s Clarissa Libertelli:

Download the Rat Facts Graphic

Download the Rodent Prevention Tips Graphic

To share these graphics under creative commons license, free of cost, we request you credit the Institute for Local Self-Reliance by including the following:

Source: Sophia Hosain, Clarissa Libertelli, and Brenda Platt, Oh, Rats! How to Avoid Rodents at Community Composting Sites, Institute for Local Self-Reliance, 2022 (ilsr.org/composting-ohrats). Reprinted with permission.

For more information on community composting, click here.