The Compost Setup

This has been a long time coming. In this post back in March, I shared the set up for the new compost bin. My plan was to have the lower tub have drain holes and several bricks for the middle tub to sit on. The middle tub would also have drain holes. I would put all my compost materials in this middle bucket. The top bucket would also have holes and bricks. It would protect the composting materials from critters. Rain would fall into the top bucket, drip through the middle bucket and mix with all the good stuff in the compost, then drain into the third bucket. I had the idea that we would set the whole thing up on a taller table that we have in the back yard and put hoses into the drain holes and have them drain into a bucket underneath the table. I didn’t know Vince was going to drill eight holes in the lower bucket. I didn’t tell him that I only wanted four holes. There’s such a communication gap – he’s an engineer and he thinks everything out and everything has to make sense. I come up with a million ideas a day. Almost all of them . . maybe ALL of them . . make no sense to anyone but me and the reality is that it’s rare that any of my ideas will work.

So, when Vince went out with all his materials, I realized . . that is way overkill to have to put hoses into eight holes, and put something . . can’t remember what it’s called . . on the front and behind each hole and that’s what the hose fits into. I was standing there saying . . I don’t think that’s what I had in mind and he was saying . . that’s what I heard you telling me you wanted. Well, that’s because I don’t know how to build anything. I just know what thought ran through my head. So, that project got put on hold.

Today I was outside and I thought . . what if we went to Walmart and bought a kiddie pool and put the top and middle tubs in the pool and the pool acts as the third/bottom bin. It collects the liquid that has drained through the compost and we have just one hose coming out? He’s just giving me that look . . like he’s thinking . . why don’t you just go cross stitch??

Then I thought . . that isn’t going to work because when it rains, the pool is going to fill up with rain water and the compost tea is going to be diluted and with spring rains, the pool could easily catch so much water that the 5 gallon bucket would overflow and someone (probably NOT me) would have to be out there draining water from the 5 gallon bucket during the middle of a storm! Vince thought he was off the hook because all of my plans were falling apart when I stopped to think about them.

Then . . I had a perfect thought! We had two tubs that were probably about 30″ wide and 40″ long. I think that would work!

You can’t see much, can you? We have this little corner of the back yard and hopefully, between the fence and the shop, no one but us can see this mess.

We ended up not needing to use the top tub because with this being up on the table and covered with a tarp, there’s a good chance the critters won’t get into the compost. So, just the middle tub with the actual compost in it is sitting in the approximately 30″ x 40″ tub. Vince drilled one hole into it, put the hose in there and whatever that thing is that holds it all together . . stuck the hose in the bucket. I put a brick in the bucket so the wind won’t blow it over before it has liquid in it.

You can’t see it in any of the pictures but Vince positioned the tarp so that it’s kind of like a funnel going down into the compost bin and cut about a 5″ hole in that part of the tarp. We have the tarp clamped onto the 30″ x 40″ tub so hopefully critters will leave it alone.

We’ll see how this works. If it works well, maybe Vince can come up with a refined version for next year.