Topic: Buttercups too poisonous for composting???

[artichoke]

A neighbour on one of my sites, when I informed her (as site rep) that we were getting a skip for rubbish, asked if it would take creeping buttercup - no, sorry, we are supposed to compost green stuff, the skip is for plastic, metal, glass type rubbish.

She told me she had read that buttercup was poisonous and should not be composted.....has anyone else heard this? I always compost buttercups, and it gives me great pleasure to see them being overwhelmed by the heat and suffocation of the bins.

[goodlife]

I have never ever heard that before.
I doubt there is issue with 'poison'...I'm sure that would get broken down during composting. They do have chemical in them that will suppress competing plant growth...but that is issue with living plants. Other than being perennials and any seed heads surviving in compost..those are only two 'issues' with buttercups that I am aware of...but if your heap heats up..even those should not be a problem.

[Digeroo]

I thought that the problem with buttercup and other perennial weeds was that they resisted composting, so you simply plant them back and off they go again.  I have always drowned my perennial weeds first or put them in a black bag until they are a slimy mess, or feed them to my rhubarb apart from nettles which seem to tolerate it.

The knotty little corm like thing of buttercups is very good at resurrections.

[Obelixx]

Buttercups are poisonous to cows and other livestock which is why it doesn'tget eaten in pastures.  It is perfectly safe to compost buttercups in a well mixed compost heap.  We compost loads of it because the stuff is so prolific here with seed sown and runner grown plants popping up every 5 minutes - or so it seems.

[goodlife]

Yep...safe ..even in garden organic's site they state with buttercup management..."Deep ploughing may kill plants if burial is deeper than 6 inches." http://www.gardenorganic.org.uk/organicweeds/downloads/ranunculus%20repens.pdf


Now question is... 'is there such a plants growing in UK that cannot be composted because they would be so poisonous'..??? There is many other season why one would not handle and compost certain plants...but just being 'poisonous'?

[artichoke]

I agree with everyone - though I do take care to compost buttercup plants in an enclosed bin where it dies, rather than on my Messy Heap, where it romps around.

But this lady carefully takes all her buttercups home to her council bin in preference to putting them into the beautiful covered compost bins her husband has built.

On the subject of weeding out buttercups, I long ago spotted that a knife scooped under the plant removes the upper part of the plant and leaves the roots in the ground. The roots never regrow (as long as the centre of the plant is completely sliced off). I believe the roots to be useful in breaking up the ground and becoming humus.

I also agree with Digeroo that any fragment of the centre of the plant, however deeply buried in dug ground, has amazing powers of recovery. It is worth digging early in the season and leaving the ground empty for a few weeks to spot any regrowth and remove it thoroughly.

[Robert_Brenchley]

I've always composted buttercups, of which I had more than I could count when I took the plot on. They rot down with no problems at all.