Can you compost old shredded blue jeans-or use as mulch? I would think as they are cotton it be be a good thing to use but I wonder about the dyes? Perhaps as mixed with mulch or compost for flower beds or trees?

-- Kelly (homearts2002@yahoo.com), March 12, 2002

Answers

We use jeans but we don't shred them, just lay them down around the tree or plant, and then cover with something like bark, straw, etc.

-- Rebekah (daniel1@itss.net), March 12, 2002.

Cotton gin waste is mentioned in Rodale's "Complete Book of Composting" as a good material for composting. Denim indeed is of vegetable origin and will quickly revert to soil if exposed to moisture and the bacteria and insects that will break it back down to basic elements. As for the blue dye, I believe that the blue dye in denim is based on the chemical elements of anil which also is vegetative. But first, don't you have some teenagers around who are willing to wear them as long as they still cover 10% of their lower body?

-- Martin Longseth (paquebot@merr.com), March 13, 2002.

Read the labels. There a jeans out there made with recycled 2 litre soft drink bottles. Styles with stretch will have synthetics which might decompose in sunlight or might not.

-- Deborah Hardy (virgil@igs.net), March 13, 2002.

Good point Martin! but these are mostly my husbands jeans and he wears them until I need to patch the patches! we havn't gotten into the streach jeans so they should be ok.

-- Kelly (homearts2002@yahoo.com), March 13, 2002.