We are building a separating dry toilet, and while I'm so excited about building it and using it, I haven't decided on the
compost method yet (the
pee part is obviously super easy). The nearest town to our
land has an industrial lumber mill, so we anticipate one way or another being able to get abundant sawdust for our purposes. Because it is so cold for so long in zone 3, I'm not sure what that will mean for the pathogen processing time. I was estimating 1-2 years, depending on the time of year the "contribution" is created. I have seen (via the interwebs) the sealed container method produce viable, pathogen free soil in relatively short times in hot places, and I have seen others using aerobic composting in
hay, with constantly monitored temperature and tending with a pitchfork, etc. in colder climates. Call me lazy, but what I'd like to do is put the well-mixed
bucket in a storage area (unheated-uninsulated) for a year or so, and then rotate it out of storage and empty it when it's "done", into a regular compost pile. Is that totally unrealistic and naive? Am I going to be sitting on (no pun intended) a billion buckets in a couple of years and regret even trying?
Should I just go with the hay (or more likely leaves in my area) and constant tending and skip the storage phase? If the container method is recommended, is there anything I should be adding before I close it up for the storage phase?
This guy's
video is awesome and informative, but he is in BC, in zone 6-7.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JuKyhUVbKwM
I've seen videos about the container method in Texas, but I'm certain there's no comparison to the temperature extremes here. So what I'm really looking for here is
advice for cold climate humanure composting, because most of the advice seems to be for places where things break down fairly quickly as they aren't frozen for half the year. I see so many videos where they're talking about "winter" and it looks like fall here. We'll get -40C, and be sitting at -25C for extended periods, as well as seeing 35C in summer, around 25C for extended periods, daytime temps. Is anyone in Northern Ontario (or other zone 3) having success with the outcome of their dry toilet, with
urine separation?
Thinking I should just knuckle down and buy the humanure handbook too
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