can you compost cinnamon brooms?
Yes, but strip the wire binding first — the broomcorn and pine straw compost like straw once the heavy cinnamon oil airs out.
breaks down in 6–12 months chopped; whole stalks are slow
C:N ≈ 80:1
which bins can take it?
- hot pile yes
- cold pile caution
- worm bin no
- bokashi no
- tumbler caution
- curbside caution
- cold pile: Whole stalks last years in a slow pile — chop them to a few inches first.
- tumbler: Long stalks wrap around the drum's core as it turns; cut them short.
- curbside: Yard-waste crews take plant stalks, not metal — clip every bit of binding wire off before the broom goes in the cart.
why?
Under the fragrance, a cinnamon broom is broomcorn (a sorghum) or pine straw — lignin-rich stalks that compost on a straw-like timeline. The scent comes from cinnamaldehyde, a genuinely antimicrobial compound that keeps the broom smelling strong for months; fresh from the store, that oil can locally slow the very microbes you're counting on. A few weeks of airing out solves it.
how to prep it
- Snip off the wire or twine binding and the hanging loop
- Air the broom outdoors for a couple of weeks to let fragrance dissipate
- Chop stalks into 2–4 inch pieces
watch out for
- The stalks are bound with wire under the wrapping — clip it all off or it ends up in your sifter.
- Straight from the shrink-wrap, the fragrance oil load is heavy; one aired-out broom at a time is the right dose.
- Ribbon and plastic berry picks on decorated brooms are trash, not compost.
quick answers
Are cinnamon brooms made of real plants?
Yes — the bristles are dried seed-head fibers from a sorghum crop, or bundled needles from pines, harvested and tied like any other farm product. Only the smell is manufactured: fragrance is sprayed on at the factory, which is why a faded broom can be refreshed with a few drops of oil rather than replaced.
Will the cinnamon smell linger in my compost?
Not for long. Cinnamaldehyde evaporates and degrades within weeks outdoors, and one broom diluted into a full pile is far below any dose that would show up in finished compost.