# Building a durable compost bin.



## Forerunner (Mar 23, 2007)

Back in later 2005, after having been composting a little more intensely than the average for several years, and after doing some reading about Jean Pain,
I took a notion one day and starting digging a trench on the east side of my house.










Never short on imagination and usually fairly well-endowed with resources, I dug deep enough to accommodate an entire semi flatbed floor, cut in three sections, to use as my form and still have 4 feet and six inches of wall above ground.










I peeled the siding off down to the tarpaper outer on the house and laid in another sheet of plastic before pouring. I was pretty happy with the initial pour and my daughter emphatically declares, to this day, that she was helping me in the following pics and not merely observing interestedly.
I don't remember, but I do know she's pretty good company, so I'm sure she was helping, _somehow_.
I dug the laterals just as deep and sandwiched two sections of semi trailer floor for the forms, leaving space enough to pour the walls 12 inches thick.


























The laterals poured up even better than the initial main wall, due to the fact that I could tie the forms together a lot better and make for a more uniform pour. Holding a dead wall eight feet and six inches high for a concrete pour is best accomplished through a feat of engineering overkill. I barely made the grade. We had some pops and cracks going on as we poured that wall against the house. By the time we did pour, I had a LOT more reinforcement laid up against those forms..... including a bulldozer blade and backhoe loader bucket.....both still firmly attached to the machines.

The finished product looks nice on a summer day.










The finished compost looks nice in the form of produce.
I know that putting the pic of young Matthew holding the fruits of our labors is a bit unfair to the more sentimental ladies, but I like to throw in something for everyone.


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## Tricky Grama (Oct 7, 2006)

Holy carp! That's awesome!


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## Ladyhen (Aug 28, 2004)

Has this caused any moisture issues in your home?


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## glazed (Aug 19, 2006)

Thank you for doing what you do, and for sharing your gift and knowledge with us.


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## Forerunner (Mar 23, 2007)

There have been no moisture issues, though, were I to build again from scratch, I would make a few changes. For one, I would build all of my walls with concrete and have compost bins on at least the north and west exposures for heat.

There has also been no odor issue do to a six inch layer of wood chips or sawdust, especially during the warmer months.
Same goes for flies, etc.... sawdust cures all evils.


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## IndyGardenGal (Apr 5, 2009)

Thank you for sharing this. I'm getting new ideas already!


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## Forerunner (Mar 23, 2007)

I might should have included this in the original text, but the structure is heavily reinforced with steel.

Note the window to the far right....the kitchen window. One of the most endearing features of the bunker is that the ladies can dump kitchen scraps right out the window, so long as the scraps aren't especially chicken-friendly. It is routine around here to make regular additions of sawdust to the kitchen portion of the pile for aesthetics and fly control in the summer.


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## IndyGardenGal (Apr 5, 2009)

I remember reading in your other composting posts, that you put a think layer of compost on your garden and fields. I'm curious, how large is your garden and how think a layer do you apply?

Also what is grown in any of the other fields you treat with compost?


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## Forerunner (Mar 23, 2007)

We have several gardens. I keep several for seed purity purposes, plus each one offers different characteristics for different crops. Some are better drained, some a little more shaded, some north facing, some south facing, etc.
All told, we are likely "gardening" an acre and a half, though that may expand by two or three times this year.
The rest of the ground I am slowly but surely building up with 6 inch compost applications spring and fall, with intent to market garden those areas eventually.
I have about ten acres under my direct control, five acres of my father's that he likes to see me keep productive, and a couple two to three acre patches that neighbors let me use so they don't have to maintain the growth from year to year.
As the patches of land get further from home, they become host to lower maintenance crops such as hay, oats, wheat or buckwheat.
The extra space here at home used to be treated such, but is slowly being converted to dent corn for the animals as we build it up to where I want it before we start gardening more intensely in those areas. I have been known to put in a half acre of watermelons and pumpkins in one of the fields, and scatter peanut seed between those vining crops to make better use of the space.


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## How Do I (Feb 11, 2008)

That's a really impressive compost bin. Thanks for sharing!


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## shanzone2001 (Dec 3, 2009)

I am impressed. My favorite part is the ability to throw the items out the kitchen window into the compost pile!:sing:


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## hillbillly (Jun 28, 2009)

do you put worms in your compost piles ?


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## Forerunner (Mar 23, 2007)

The worms just come. Even those smelly, wonderful red wrigglers.

I just dug into one of my monster piles, probably 80-100 semi-loads in one pile, built on sand and clay last year, and as I broke through the crust and got to the material that was in the final stages, there were red wrigglers _everywhere_, about a foot or eighteen inches below the surface. Now, by red wriggler, I mean the little ringed fellows that stink, gyrate enthusiastically and make great fish bait.
They are always followed by the common, fatter, more palish worms and then the larger nightcrawler.


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## ar_wildflower (Jan 2, 2010)

"Durable" compost bin is an understatement! That looks great, and that garden looks like (alot of work) homesteader heaven.


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## IndyGardenGal (Apr 5, 2009)

Forerunner said:


> We have several gardens. I keep several for seed purity purposes, plus each one offers different characteristics for different crops. Some are better drained, some a little more shaded, some north facing, some south facing, etc.
> All told, we are likely "gardening" an acre and a half, though that may expand by two or three times this year.
> The rest of the ground I am slowly but surely building up with 6 inch compost applications spring and fall, with intent to market garden those areas eventually.
> I have about ten acres under my direct control, five acres of my father's that he likes to see me keep productive, and a couple two to three acre patches that neighbors let me use so they don't have to maintain the growth from year to year.
> ...


Do you grow the wheat, oats, and buckwheat for your family consumption or animal feed? We're hoping to get a big enough compost pile going that we can slowly build up our gardening areas and the few acres we have set aside for hay. We've always been interested in learning from others who raise grain on a smaller scale as well.


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## Forerunner (Mar 23, 2007)

We use them all for both, except for the oats.
I've yet to build a roaster/dehuller.

Both the wheat and the buckwheat are labor intensive by hand.
I plant with a small grain drill and hire a neighbor to combine the small grain crops.
I have scythed wheat and rye by hand and threshed out a few bushels just to prove to myself that it can be done, and it can.
All of that is why I really enjoy growing corn.
The whole affair can be accomplished by hand and still have a lot to show for the effort.
If you have bees, the buckwheat is doubly valuable to your homestead.
Buckwheat flowers are blooming (if planted in late June/early July) when most spring/summer flowers are done and the fall flowers have yet to bloom.


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## raybait1 (Sep 30, 2006)

Thanks Forerunner. I always enjoy your compost posts. Im reading "The Complete Book of Composting" that you recommended in another thread.


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## Forerunner (Mar 23, 2007)

Well Ray.....you're communing with the source now...
There's something positively spiritual about that book.
I well remember what it did for my understanding and resolve regarding the noble art of soil building.

For the visually stimulated, I offer another round of organic inspiration.

Here we are, this last spring, fixing to prepare a field for oats.
Proper equipment sure speeds up the job.
A rich product makes the effort worth while.


















I'm sure going to miss that spreader.










There's nothing so gratifying as a field laid in with compost.
I started with sandy clay on this plot, not so very long ago.


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## Forerunner (Mar 23, 2007)

One of the most labor saving devices ever invented was the disc.
You can put a thousand men with hoes in the field with the turn of a key.
I don't take that for granted.










A good harrow sure makes a nice job of finishing. Brings up all the bones, rocks and sticks for the trash pickers, too.....


























Planting was always a real treat with my old 8 foot model B John Deere drill and Dad's model A popper. 










I lost both in the fire.










Paradise must consist largely of varying shades of green.


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## Callieslamb (Feb 27, 2007)

You were right - UNFAIR to post the picture of Matthew the cutie and his veggies. Now I want one just like him!


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## Bluebird (Feb 1, 2006)

Forerunner,
What kind of mulch do you use in your garden. The pictures with that cute at the beginning of the post looks like he is sitting on wood chips. If it is, how many inches are on that garden bed? Great Pictures and awsome compost bins.


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## Forerunner (Mar 23, 2007)

Garden mulch is a study in itself.

I tend to over think everything, and mulching is usually not an exception.
I can't generally just bring myself to casually throw something down on my soil and call it good. It has to make _sense_.
Some say I'm a fanatic. I guess I hope so.

It depends largely on the crop I'm working with, and what that crop prefers to have ready access to.

I like to put my most valuable soil feed directly on the soil, when I mulch.
That might be compost, aged manures or fresh grass clippings.
My preferred mineral supplements, i.e. bone meal, kelp meal, Redmond conditioner, ashes, etc. go in there somewhere toward the bottom.
Then, if I have it, I might put cardboard on top of that to keep weeds down
and lock things in. For aesthetics and a neutral top coat, the chips work great. Shredded leaves might do as well, but you'd be losing a bit of N if they were left exposed, hence my preference to use a high carbon top coat.

The worms thoroughly enjoy wood chips as a stand alone dinner and dessert.
On a warm, moist night, the chips are literally in constant motion with the dew worm action. That goes for the chipped paths around the house, as well.
It doesn't take but a season for the worms to break the chips down to rich blackness. We have to renew the paths twice a year, and we put the black on the gardens every time.

Some crops, such as potatoes, really appreciate your keeping their soil a bit on the cool and moist side. You can mulch them as soon as you plant, though I like to let them come up ten inches or so, hill and weed them once with the hoe, and then mulch right up to the top leaves with not so fresh grass clippings and straw. That melds down nicely as the taters mature and protects the upper spuds from sunlight.

Tomatoes like warm moist soil, so they like to grow a bit and prefer their mulch after the soil temp is fairly high.
Peppers like it a bit drier and warm. Mulching them can be a tossup.
On a wet year it might be better to leave their dirt bare. On a dry year, they do appreciate a mulching and it sure makes the rows look nice.

The mulch in the pic you referenced was probably layed in on an inch of compost spread after the crop was in, in addition to what would have been worked in prior to planting. The chips were probably three inches deep, max.

One of the most valuable benefits of compost is it's introduction of high bacteria populations of widely varied strains, which greatly facilitates the rapid breakdown of the coarsest mulch materials.


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## Bluebird (Feb 1, 2006)

Thanks for your info. It's a lot of fun trying to figure out what works and doesn't and I appreciate all the info we get on this web site from others trying out and sharing what works for them. You are right about the worms. Our soil had be farmed really hard by some large dairy farmers in the area. They rented the land and didn't care much about the soil. We've had to work really hard to get the veg garden soil going. With the addition of the 2 year old wood chips on top of some soil and leaf compost and then a layer of 1 year old chips on the top of those, you didn't have to dig much to find worms doing their work. What surprised me was that you had to work really hard to find any in the soil when we first started and shortly after adding the compost - there they were.


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## pfaubush (Aug 17, 2009)

Wow, I am getting ready to build a composter and saw this thread. I am so glad I did. It has been awesome to see how you've done it...and how well it has paid off. I don't think I will need anything quite as big and stout, but appreciate all of the info.


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## Forerunner (Mar 23, 2007)

Well, for those interested who've yet to see the link, here are some articles that I've written giving a history and application of my own composting experiences.

http://www.homesteadingtoday.com/showthread.php?t=332336


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## 65284 (Sep 17, 2003)

Beautiful gardens. Does it make any difference what species of tree chips and sawdust come from? I know that Walnut and related Juglans species aren't suitable, are there any others that shouldn't be used? 

There are several Amish saw mills in this area that have immense piles of sawdust, mostly Oak, and it's free for the taking.


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## Forerunner (Mar 23, 2007)

Oak by by-products would be perfect.
I don't spread my sawdust or chip mulches very deep. 
I keep sawdust a little further from the growing plants to reduce the risk of a nitrogen deficiency. I do frequently lay compost in as mulch and cover that with the raw wood products. 

Walnut and cedar I put through the compost piles before applying them to the soil. Hedge and locust might do well to be composted first, due to their high oil content and subsequent resistance to decay. I do doubt that either are any more detrimental to the soil in their raw form.


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## am1too (Dec 30, 2009)

Forerunner said:


> I might should have included this in the original text, but the structure is heavily reinforced with steel.
> 
> Note the window to the far right....the kitchen window. One of the most endearing features of the bunker is that the ladies can dump kitchen scraps right out the window, so long as the scraps aren't especially chicken-friendly. It is routine around here to make regular additions of sawdust to the kitchen portion of the pile for aesthetics and fly control in the summer.


Do you ever start a fresh batch in those very nice bins?


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## Forerunner (Mar 23, 2007)

Yup. 

Each late fall.

I load 'em up with good stuff for the heating effect over the winter.

Then we dip out of them for the late spring setting out of tomatoes, peppers, sweet taters, etc., and spread the rest around fruit trees and on the fields over the summer.

I always leave a little finished stuff for more immediate worm and microbe inoculation for the next batch.


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## CesumPec (May 20, 2011)

Durable?!? Those things probably wont last but for a few thousand years. Then what are you going to do?


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## Forerunner (Mar 23, 2007)

Have my neighbor bury them with the backhoe. :hysterical:















No, seriously.




By the time these fall apart, there will be archeologists poking around them trying to figure out what some idiot had in mind..... :shrug:


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