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Solomon, Steve

"Organic Gardener's Composting"


I am doing my best to be fair.
Visual appeal is the primary benefit of making compost in a
container. To a tidy, northern European sense of order, any
composting structure will be far neater than the raw beauty of a
naked heap. Composting container designs may offer additional
advantages but no single structure will do everything possible. With
an enclosure, it may be possible to heat up a pile smaller than 1' x
4' x 4' because the walls and sometimes the top of the container may
be insulating. This is a great advantage to someone with a postage
stamp backyard that treasures every square foot. Similarly, wrapping
the heap retards moisture loss. Some structures shut out vermin.
On the other hand, structures can make it more difficult to make
compost. Using a prefabricated bin can prevent a person from readily
turning the heap and can almost force a person to also buy some sort
of shredder/chipper to first reduce the size of the material. Also,
viewed as a depreciating economic asset with a limited life span,
many composting aids cost as much or more money as the value of all
the material they can ever turn out. Financial cost relates to
ecological cost, so spending money on short-lived plastic or easily
rusted metal may negate any environmental benefit gained from
recycling yard wastes.
Building Your Own Bin
Probably the best homemade composting design is the multiple bin
system where separate compartments facilitate continuous
decomposition.


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