Hello and welcome to The Compost Bin. I'm Compostwoman and I live with my family in rural Herefordshire. We have nearly four acres of garden and woodland, all managed organically and to Permaculture principles, which we share with Chickens, Cats and assorted wildlife. We also grow a lot of our own food, run courses in all sorts of things and make a lot of compost!

I am a Master Composter and have spent more than a decade as a volunteer Community Compost adviser with Garden Organic and my local Council.
I'm a self employed Environmental Educator so I run workshops and events where I talk about compost, veg growing, chicken keeping, cooking, preserving and sustainable living. I also run crafts workshops and Forest School/outdoor play sessions in our wood.

We try to live a more self sufficient lifestyle here, as best we can, while still having a comfortable life and lots of fun.


To learn more about us click on the About Compostwoman tab and remember to click on the photos to make them full size!


Saturday 2 February 2013

Refurbishing the compostbins part 1

As you all know we have a lot of compost bins of assorted make and style and we make a lot of compost.

 My favourite bins are the "New Zealand" style wooden, slatted bins, so easy to put together and so easy to dismantle and re errect, as needed.

Mine are all from The Recycle Works and I got the first 3 bins as part of a discount offer from my local council, back before I was even a Master Composter or anything - I think in 2003... certainly it was well before Compostgirl started pre school in 2004

And now some parts of those original compost bins have reached their use by date...and need replacing.





The ends have rotted away  from some of the planks


Some of the centre posts have broken up

 

And generally they need a bit of tender loving care and some new parts to restore them to splendidness.

 

  Now, the good thing about these compost bins is that you only have to replace the damaged bits! You can buy the individual posts and planks from The Recycle Works so it is very economical to repair them



So today we started to dismantle the compost bins, so as to see how many parts needed replacing.  This, of course, meant moving the finished compost from out of them, so we could take them to bits.  Which meant I had to find a place to put all the aforementioned finished compost...

Fortunately I had a cunning plan...I had a waiting raised bed which needed a lot of compost putting in it, to fill it up, ready for planting potatoes in the next month or so.


As we dismantled the compost bins we found some of the centre posts had rotted where they touched the ground

And some of the boards had rotted through or lost their end plates.


As always, we had company while we worked, both of the feline


and the chicken sort! The chickens were going mad to get to the worms we were exposing.


We got the bins dismantled and the area cleared, ready to sort out those planks and posts which could be re used and those which were too far gone and would need to be burnt.

The wood is not treated, apart from a paint on water based, animal, insect and bird friendly stain, so I think to survive being buried deep in compost for around 10 years before finally rotting a bit  is impressive indeed.


Today was cold but gloriously sunny and we really enjoyed being able to get outside and do something

More tomorrow  as we put the new planks and centres together and re fill the bins - fingers crossed the weather holds out.

The Recycle Works have two special offers on this weekend - 

Two Very Special Brief Offers

compost duvet
This week our Brief Offer is all about protection! 

Offer One: Buy a Big Square Compost Duvet for only £13.99 instead of the normal price of £18.99 saving you £5 on each one you purchase.

All you need to do is enter the code BIGSQUAREDUVET in to the discount code box when ordering and your savings will be automatically applied.

Offer Two: Buy our Frost Protection Fleece at a special price. Buy one for £6.60 or buy two for £12.99.

To take advantage of this offer you just need to give us a call on 01254 820088 and we'll sort our your order for you!

 
Love Your Environment! Love Your Protection!

*Terms & Conditions Apply. New orders only. No other discount code can be applied with this offer. Free Delivery applies to Mainland UK* orders over £50. 

Brief Offers Available Until Midnight on Sunday 3rd February

1 comment:

  1. I only have two compost bins which are made in the same way as yours, it is so easy just to remove the slats when you need to empty it. Looks like you have yourselves a lot of work replacing and repairing your woodwork, it's an ongoing job isn't it.

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