Pictures of new compost bins!

Just for fun.

I painted the outside with paint from The Real Milk Paint Company and also used their outdoor defense oil to help the wood from rotting.

The front boards are removable.

Looks nice. Why all the hardware cloth, even on the bottom. Mice issue?

Fancaaaye!    You put my ramshackle pallet walls on dirt to shame

You obviously enjoy woodworking.  I dream of having time to build those removable plank walls.

wayne fajkus wrote:Looks nice. Why all the hardware cloth, even on the bottom. Mice issue?

My wife was concerned about attracting rodents so I promised her I would make it solid. It also gave me the excuse to build a durable long lasting composter!

I am hoping to put my first batch on this week.

[quote=Susan Pruitt]Fancaaaye!    You put my ramshackle pallet walls on dirt to shame

You obviously enjoy woodworking.  I dream of having time to build those removable plank walls.[/quote]

I did really enjoy it!

They look great and the removable boards will make it much easier to pull stuff out, but my concern is with that bottom screen.  Your compost will sift through it and that gap will soon fill up with all the best stuff.  Further, that'll make it difficult to get in there quickly with a hay fork and give it a turn.  My hunch is that the tines of your fork will constantly snag on that wire mesh.  You may want to cut a square piece of plywood and drop it into place.

To reassure your wife, rodents and critters really don't want much to do with a 150 degree compost pile, and then once it's cooked like that for a couple of days, there isn't anything for them to eat even after the pile begins to cool down.

Let us know how that works.  You can always pull that mesh off the floor if it proves to be a pain in the arse.

Ya, i have the same concern about the bottom. I don't have any plywood with me at the moment so I though I would roll with it and see what happens. It will help a lot of air get into there though!

It should be ok. Letting that gap fill in would be preferred, then let it stay there. You only lose it once, if that makes sense. Or add dirt to fill it in. Having a connection with the ground gives access to the organisms that break it into compost, allow worms to come up, etc.

That looks great. I'm planning something similar for the spring. Right now I've just got an old garbage bin and a loose pile with a tarp over it, but I'd really like to have something like that. It would look much nicer.

Sweet! but I'm going to have to hide this thread from wolf, one look at those purple bins and I'll have yet another project added to the two page list I already have.

More picture! You can see my first batch and my second batch. Things are moving along. The darker one was started about 3 weeks ago.

It is mostly Doug fir and spruce that went through a mulcher/chipper. There is also some maple leaves, garden scrapes and some straw.