General – Page 157 – Crazy About Compost

Compost Toilet System (video)

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBZwOqLJvBA In the spirit of humanure composting, I started looking at other videos on Youtube besides those created by the master Joseph Jenkins to see what's happening. After reading Humanure Handbook twice, it was interesting to see this system in place and wonder where they adapted it from. My main question is simply why they go to all the trouble of having dozens of buckets sitting around with small quantities of material in them when they could just build two 5'x5'x5' compost bins and do it that way instead. Either way, composting is composting and it's great to see this going on. Also, regarding their compost toilet, she mentions the only odors being from when there's too much urine...this can simply be solved by adding more cover materials. I started…

Help My Compost Pile! – Red Frog Beach, Panama

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qKlH9pO5V94 While I was on vacation in Bocas del Toro, Panama, I discovered a compost bin at the Palmer Tent Lodge on Red Frog Beach. It's always nice to see a composting system in place when traveling, or anytime really. Of course I had to take a peek! It looked like the majority of the bin's contents were food scraps, with all of the cardboard laying on top in sheets. There was a good deal of bugs and the contents seemed a bit dry. I decided to help out by shredding up the cardboard into smaller pieces and mixing it in with the pile. This will help speed up the process a bit and get the pile in balance. They also had a nifty finished compost bin next to it,…

The Truth About Composting Paper Cups

Can you compost paper cups? The answer is yes, no and depends. In the same spirit as my last post on composting waxed paper, I emailed a bunch of companies that produce paper cups and asked them if their cups contained a plastic liner, and if so, what kind was used. With the exception of Solo and Chinet, all the other companies got back to me (although Dart and Solo appear to be part of the same conglomerate, and Dart replied). I couldn't tell if the customer service people were weirded out by my questions...am I the only person asking this? Probably close to it, but hopefully not the only one. My research into Solo was definitely the most peculiar. I had no idea there was a (terrible) song dedicated…