AN EASY 5 BIN COMPOST SYSTEM

One of our greatest assets down at PIE is our partnership with the Watershed Family Resource Center's Food Bank... This month alone, the WFRC's food bank had about 750 lbs of non-edible produce that we have already begun turning into lost of great compost for the gardens! Like most of our projects at PIE, we decided to build our 5 bin compost system from re-claimed wood pallets. First, we flattened down the ground where the walls of our compost bins were going to be. Next, we set full sized pallets around the outer edges and half pallets as inner 'half walls'. We nailed the pallets together using 3" nails. (Shown above is 3 of the 5 bins created.) Before we began laying on non-edible produce, we decided to lay down a thick double layer of cardboard to stop any bermuda grass or other weeds from trying to sneak into our compost piles. The next layer we added was a bed of straw for the compost to begin on. Each layer of 'green' (fruits, vegetable, produce) is chopped up and then covered in a layer of 'brown' (grass clippings, straw, shredded paper, old peat moss cups, coffee... etc.) The compost pile is built up this way, kind of making it like a 'compost lasagna'. Hahaha! Soaking every 'brown' layer will help the compost pile to get hotter faster, aiding in faster breaking down of the layers. (I have seen Damian's piles of compost up at Dunbar Garden reach 160 degrees before! He told me that they cooked a potato in it once actually! Yesss!) As the layers break down, the piles are flipped over into the next bin in succession to the right. By the time the compost reaches the 5th bin... it will be ready to spread out into the garden!