#how to make a composter

[bumblebeeappletree]

Costa makes a compost tumbler for easy composting.

Making your own compost can be daunting; a key to its success is regularly turning your compost pile to keep it aerated, activating the microbes working to break down the ingredients.

There are different ways to do this – with a permanent air tube, a fork or a compost screw-turner. But if turning compost isn’t for you, then Costa has an alternative – a compost tumbler. These spin on a central axle so make turning easy. They are also enclosed and off the ground, keeping vermin out, and they’re easy to unload – wheel up your barrow, remove the lid and tip the compost out.

You can buy one ready-made but here's how you can make your own.

What you’ll need:

TOOLS:

- Power drill

- Spade bit (to diameter of pipe - see below)

- PPE: glasses, ear protection

- Clamps

- Saw (circular saw is easier but you could get away with a decent hand saw)

- Pencil

- Set square to mark 45 degree cuts

- Tape measure

MATERIALS:

- Approximately 6 metres of timber, ideally around 42mm x 100mm, hardwood or treated for outdoor use

- Galvanised or stainless-steel screws

- Plastic food storage barrel, around 200 litres *

- Threaded galvanised pipe (this will be the tumbler’s axle) **

- Plastic spacers that fit over the galvanised pipe ends to stop the barrel hitting the frame (cut to size as needed)

- 2 metal pipe end caps to same diameter as pipe

* Barrels are easy to source from food wholesales – Costa has a 220L one that was previously used for transporting bulk olives. Ones with a screw top are good to enclose the materials. Food-safe containers will have a symbol on the side featuring a cup and fork.

** The metal axle needs to be long enough to fit through the barrel with enough spare on either end to fit through both planks of wood at either end, plus 3-4cm extra for ease of movement.

What you do:

First, cut the timber for the frame legs, approximately 4 x 1.5m pieces. You will need at least two shorter pieces for the cross bracing, but these can be cut later. If these legs are joined at right angles to each other at the top of the frame, your axle will be about 1m off the ground; to lift it higher, either cut longer legs or join the legs at a more acute angle (less than 90 degrees).

Mark off where you need to cut the timber, using the set square to get a straight line and cut to length.

Clamp two leg pieces together then use the spade bit to drill an axle hole through them, about 100mm from the end or so the hole sits in the centre of the area where the two pieces of timber will cross. If your drill bit is long enough you can cut all four pieces of wood in one go, otherwise repeat this for the other two legs.

Unclamp the legs, arrange them at right angles (or at your chosen angle to achieve the desired height; see above) clamp them together again and fix in place with screws. Repeat with the second pair of legs, making sure you fix them at exactly the same angle as the first pair.

Next, calculate the central point of the barrel – this is where the axle will go through and it won’t spin properly if it’s off-centre. To do this, measure the height of the barrel, then halve this and use that measurement to mark the point that is halfway. Next measure the circumference of the barrel and again halve this to work out two halfway points; these points on either side of the barrel are where you need to cut two holes, again using the spade bit, for the galvanised pipe to fit through.

The hole needs to be a good snug fit to avoid any leakage, so don’t be surprised if it takes a bit of effort to push the axle pipe through.

Next place the barrel on a wheelbarrow to support it while you fit the frame around it.

Put spacers on either end of the galvanised tube axle.

Fit the timber legs on the pipe ends and screw on the metal caps to hold it in place.

Lock the frame even more securely by adding some timber bracing. Costa fixes two pieces across the middle and one across one end, leaving the other end open so that a wheelbarrow can be placed right under the tumbler for easy access.

[reksink]

Comms for Those in the Realm of Discord 💚

[butts-bouncing-on-the-beltway]

WE GOT TURTLE BEANS AND LOVES LIES BLEEDING IN THE GARDEN FOLKS

[edge-oftheworld]

i know there's a run greyhound run in me but right now i'm tied up hazy and emotionally unaware

[hello-delicious-tea]

Teaschooler just cooked his first pita, start to finish - we measured the ingredients together, and he rolled three out (I rolled out the other nine, but he's improved in speed from when I did twenty-two gyoza and he did two), and he FLIPPED THE PITA BY HIMSELF. And he put it in the bread bowl all by self too! We did the first eleven together, and then he had to use his new knowledge to decide when to flip it.

Some intervention was needed to prevent him from flipping it thirty times in a row in sheer delight at his new skill, but this is like 80% all by self.

[impossible-rat-babies]

thinking about dirge’s foster parents ;—;

[deadmomjokes]

Good news: Got the garden planted today. In approximately 4-8 weeks I shall enjoy bounteous harvests of fresh leek, peas, spinach, and several varieties of cruciferous veg.

Bad news: Forgot I was still recovering from pneumonia when I went about planting said garden. Currently back to being unable to move more than 10 ft at a time before my body shuts that nonsense down and forces me to rest.

But at least it waited til I was done, so.... Win?

[stagnantblood]

1-4, 12, 14 - 15 for bug and compost!!!

let's give it up for these nerds.. oo

1. what's their most trivial fear?

bug: eyes that watch her. bonus points if it's abstract/purposefully strange imagery like floating eyes or something like that. she gets the heebie jeebies a little and the hair on the back of her neck will stand on end. worst case scenario she starts to get anxious and has to physically distance herself from it.

compost: fire. they aren'r really that afraid of it, but watching flames in a campfire or staring at candlelight makes them feel unsettled.

2. their favorite type of joke?

bug: idk actually. her favorite joke is probably whatever other people laugh for and that she feels comfortable about joining in with..

compost: sex jokes/innuendos

3. are they clumsy?

bug: when not trying to be stealthy, yea. plus she's bigger than humans and that doesn't help since most buildings/furniture/etc. are designed only for them. but when sneaking around, all that clumsiness just vanishes :)

compost: one of their abilities is to constantly perceive things thru the insects around them, which helps them stay aware of the area. if there's an overwhelmingly hugee swarm of insects, they might have difficulty navigating and seem clumsy as a result. otherwise, compost isn't clumsy at all.

4. what's their sense of humor like?

bug: kind of innocent. she's oblivious to some social stuff, so jokes and sarcasm aren't her strong suit.

compost: crude. the nastier the better. poetic justice is good too- if some guy takes a baseball bat to a hornet's nest and then gets the shit stung out of him, they'll laugh.

12. what kind of sibling would they be? what vibes do they give off regardless of what they actually are?

bug: only child. i think it fits her. lonely little bug...

compost: also an only child, but that's bc they consumed all their siblings. average younger sibling behavior ngl (<- saying this as the younger sibling in my family)

14. parental issues?

bug: she doesn't know if they're alive or not, but can't remember who they were anyways. normally that'd cause some parental issues, but bug just avoids thinking about it and therefore has No Issues. none at all. no she's not crying, she's just allergic to something in the air

compost: none. compost was formed from rot and leaf litter like all of its siblings (before compost ate them anyways). they never knew or had any relationship with the parent thay gave all of itself to form them. even if compost knew, they wouldn't care.

15. would they be a good parent?

bug: probably? the chances of her ever ending up with kids (adopted since she can't have her own) are extremely slim but. if it happened she would be a very kind and compassionate parent. maybe a little distant emotionally sometimes tho

compost: they would either be a deadbeat dad or like. the most amazing parent ever. idk which though... here's some lore though. compost could reproduce by breaking off parts of themself and just. letting them form another creature. compost's kind isn't a flesh and blood beast, so it wouldn't hurt that much.

[comehithercornking]

Color me fucking depressed about climate change

[bumblebeeappletree]

Jude constructs a hot compost bay layered with the perfect ingredients to feed a productive patch.

On a sloping block in the Blue Mountains, Jude has many projects on the go. To keep the garden cranking, Jude’s been learning a lot about compost. “This stuff is gold,” says Jude, “it adds nutrients, water and is the life of the soil.” Here’s how to construct a hot compost bay to feed a productive patch.

The Built Structure:

Jude’s two-bay compost system can house about two cubic metres and was constructed with the help of a mate. They’ve used recycled pallets which are heat treated to make sure the compost is safe to put on edible produce. It has gates at the front, low enough for a wheelbarrow, and is clad with corrugated iron. Jude says the corrugated iron “makes a really good backing when you're digging into the compost, and they also heat it up.” It’s a good idea to install a chicken-wire tube in the centre of the bay for airflow.

Compost is broken down organic matter and is full of nutrients that plants thrive on. Organic matter is anything that was once alive, like plants, animals, and even manures. This material can be broken down slowly by worms in a cool compost system, but in a hot compost system, it’s broken down by millions of micro-organisms and fungi. A big mass of material paired with a lot of microbial action generates a lot of heat. Jude says, “hot compost is a great way to get a lot of compost in a very short amount of time.”

Hot compost needs to be built it all in one go, at least one cubic metre in size. Jude says smaller composts “won't generate the heat required to breakdown the organic matter.” The ideal temperature for hot compost is 60°C, anything higher is way too hot to support the microbes. Regular turning for airflow will help manage the temperature. Jude’s got the perfect ingredients for a healthy hot compost habitat to provide these critters food, air and moisture.

Green & Brown Materials:

Good compost has “a mix of greens and browns,” says Jude. Brown layers are carbon-rich material such as cardboard, sticks, newspaper and straw. These offer energy to the microbes, absorb moisture and improve airflow. Green layers are not always green in colour. Greens are nitrogen-rich materials such as grass clippings, coffee grounds and food scraps. Jude says, “as a general rule of thumb, you want at least twice as much of the carbon-rich material as the nitrogen-rich green stuff.”

Layer #1: Brown:

Cover the base with a carbon layer of sticks and twigs. The rough textures allow excess water to drain, will bulk out the base and help oxygen get into the pile. Jude says, “when I'm adding a layer of carbon, I'm watering it in. I'm aiming for a pile that's moist but not soaking wet.” A layer of wet newspaper on top of the twigs will help create this environment.

Layer #2: Green:

Repurpose your old kitchen scraps and leafy garden waste. Jude says, “avoid meat, bread and dairy” to keep rodents away, and make sure you’re “not adding any weeds with seeds, bulbs or runners.” Break big sections up with a spade to help it breakdown faster. Jude says, “adding diverse nutrients like comfrey will help fire up microbial life.”

Layer #3: Brown:

A thick layer of straw mulch will act as a blanket for all that heating mass underneath. In two weeks, this pile can be lifted and moved into the second bay and turned every few weeks. Check the pile regularly to see if it needs more water or aeration.

You’ll know it's ready when it begins to look like yummy crumbly chocolate cake. Like the one Jude’s brother Charlie was inspired to make - what a team!

[luulapants]

25 ways to be a little more punk in 2025

Cut fast fashion - buy used, learn to mend and/or make your own clothes, buy fewer clothes less often so you can save up for ethically made quality

Cancel subscriptions - relearn how to pirate media, spend $10/month buying a digital album from a small artist instead of on Spotify, stream on free services since the paid ones make you watch ads anyway

Green your community - there's lots of ways to do this, like seedbombing or joining a community garden or organizing neighborhood trash pickups

Be kind - stop to give directions, check on stopped cars, smile at kids, let people cut you in line, offer to get stuff off the high shelf, hold the door, ask people if they're okay

Intervene - learn bystander intervention techniques and be prepared to use them, even if it feels awkward

Get closer to your food - grow it yourself, can and preserve it, buy from a farmstand, learn where it's from, go fishing, make it from scratch, learn a new ingredient

Use opensource software - try LibreOffice, try Reaper, learn Linux, use a free Photoshop clone. The next time an app tries to force you to pay, look to see if there's an opensource alternative

Make less trash - start a compost, be mindful of packaging, find another use for that plastic, make it a challenge for yourself!

Get involved in local politics - show up at meetings for city council, the zoning commission, the park district, school boards; fight the NIMBYs that always show up and force them to focus on the things impacting the most vulnerable folks in your community

DIY > fashion - shake off the obsession with pristine presentation that you've been taught! Cut your own hair, use homemade cosmetics, exchange mani/pedis with friends, make your own jewelry, duct tape those broken headphones!

Ditch Google - Chromium browsers (which is almost all of them) are now bloated spyware, and Google search sucks now, so why not finally make the jump to Firefox and another search like DuckDuckGo? Or put the Wikipedia app on your phone and look things up there?

Forage - learn about local edible plants and how to safely and sustainably harvest them or go find fruit trees and such accessible to the public.

Volunteer - every week tutoring at the library or once a month at the humane society or twice a year serving food at the soup kitchen, you can find something that matches your availability

Help your neighbors - which means you have to meet them first and find out how you can help (including your unhoused neighbors), like elderly or disabled folks that might need help with yardwork or who that escape artist dog belongs to or whether the police have been hassling people sleeping rough

Fix stuff - the next time something breaks (a small appliance, an electronic, a piece of furniture, etc.), see if you can figure out what's wrong with it, if there are tutorials on fixing it, or if you can order a replacement part from the manufacturer instead of trashing the whole thing

Mix up your transit - find out what's walkable, try biking instead of driving, try public transit and complain to the city if it sucks, take a train instead of a plane, start a carpool at work

Engage in the arts - go see a local play, check out an art gallery or a small museum, buy art from the farmer's market

Go to the library - to check out a book or a movie or a CD, to use the computers or the printer, to find out if they have other weird rentals like a seed library or luggage, to use meeting space, to file your taxes, to take a class, to ask question

Listen local - see what's happening at local music venues or other events where local musicians will be performing, stop for buskers, find a favorite artist, and support them

Buy local - it's less convenient than online shopping or going to a big box store that sells everything, but try buying what you can from small local shops in your area

Become unmarketable - there are a lot of ways you can disrupt your online marketing surveillance, including buying less, using decoy emails, deleting or removing permissions from apps that spy on you, checking your privacy settings, not clicking advertising links, and...

Use cash - go to the bank and take out cash instead of using your credit card or e-payment for everything! It's better on small businesses and it's untraceable

Give what you can - as capitalism churns on, normal shmucks have less and less, so think about what you can give (time, money, skills, space, stuff) and how it will make the most impact

Talk about wages - with your coworkers, with your friends, while unionizing! Stop thinking about wages as a measure of your worth and talk about whether or not the bosses are paying fairly for the labor they receive

Think about wealthflow - there are a thousand little mechanisms that corporations and billionaires use to capture wealth from the lower class: fees for transactions, interest, vendor platforms, subscriptions, and more. Start thinking about where your money goes, how and where it's getting captured and removed from our class, and where you have the ability to cut off the flow and pass cash directly to your fellow working class people

[jensownzoo]

Cornflower. Can't stop taking pics of these because they're dominating the front in-ground vegetable bed right now.

However the Climbing Peace rose is putting out some excellent effort, using a small redbud tree for support as it arches over the bed.

On a smaller note, the sweet alyssum in the back bed is blooming. It started out white and has progressively been getting more purple as time goes on (Royal Carpet variety).

I'm fairly impressed with how fast these tomato plants have doubled in size. They're just starting to put out flower bracts too or I'd be worried the bed was too nitrogen-rich. These are the ones I transplanted in trench-style, so we'll see how well they do once the rain goes away in summer. Trying to assess the benefit of more overall roots (trench-style) vs the benefit of roots in two different depths (deep-planted style) in my particular climate and ability to water. I suspect that the trenchers are going to struggle more when the drought conditions hit because I only give each plant 2 quarts of water once weekly when it's not raining to stretch out the supply I have collected in the rain barrels (no outdoor spigot due to Plumbing Issues).

I picked up three good gardening finds during this week's run for food waste for the chickens. The first is a nice load of nursery pots which was expected due to mother's day weekend.

Now I just have to wash and disinfect all of them. I also picked up three trays that the pots fit into so the clean pots will get racked and stacked in the shed in them for ease of grabbing a whole flat when I need to pot up anything.

Then there was a small bag of chopped straw:

I did fill one of the nesting boxes with it simply for convenience, but the rest will be used for mulch in situations where woodchips aren't appropriate.

And finally the haul that had me the most excited:

Half a grocery sack full of "old" seeds! There are over 20 packets and none of them are older than 2020 (5 years younger than a lot of the seeds I worked with this year btw). Quite a variety of vegetables, though nothing too unusual. There was one packet of peppermint seed, which I really don't need given the amount that's already growing, so I've earmarked that for guerrilla alleyway beautification.

Anyway, I'm happy about how things are going gardenwise this year. I think the combination of adding mineral-based fertilizers last year, getting plenty of rain this spring, and breaking things up into little tasks done every day (and kept accountable by posting here) has really helped to kick things off.

[greentistambassador]

How to Start Composting at Home: A Beginner’s Guide to Turning Waste into Wealth

Looking to reduce kitchen waste and help the planet? Learning how to start composting at home is a simple and rewarding step toward sustainable living. Whether you're in a small apartment or a home with a garden, composting food waste for beginners is easier than you might think.

First, understand what compost is — it's the nutrient-rich soil that forms when organic materials like vegetable peels, fruit scraps, coffee grounds, and dry leaves break down naturally. This dark, crumbly substance is often called “black gold” because of its incredible ability to enrich soil and help plants thrive.

Wondering how to compost at home? Start by setting up a bin or compost pile in your backyard, balcony, or even under your kitchen sink. Choose a compost bin that suits your space – from compact bokashi bins to outdoor tumblers. The key is to mix green materials (like food scraps) with brown materials (like dry leaves or cardboard) to balance moisture and carbon.

When learning how to make compost, remember to stir the mix regularly and keep it moist (like a wrung-out sponge). In a few weeks to months, you'll have rich compost ready to feed your plants or garden.

Knowing how to compost helps reduce landfill waste, lowers greenhouse gas emissions, and gives you a free, natural fertilizer. It's a small change that makes a big impact.

If you're new to this, don’t worry. Start with small steps, observe what works, and enjoy the process. With a bit of time and effort, composting food waste for beginners becomes a rewarding habit that contributes to a greener, cleaner world. Start today and turn your food waste into something wonderful!

[trollbreak]

Eiteth horrors <3

[farmerstrend]

Biochar in Agriculture: Why Kenyan Farmers Should Start Using Biochar for Sustainable Farming

Biochar is an age-old method of improving soil health. The earliest known use of biochar in agriculture was over 2,000 years ago by the pre-Columbian indigenous people of the Amazon Basin. When scientists tested the soil in the area, they noticed how it had remained rich for over eight hundred years. This is because the indigenous people of the Amazon Basin used amended leftover charcoal from…

[bruisedconscience-reblogs]

minding my business stressed at work:

brain: HERES SOME TRAUMA YOU HAD WHEN YOU WERE YOUNG

me: uh ok! bye thanks!

me minding my business at home, stressed about work:

my brain: HERES SOME OTHER TRAUMA U ALSO EXPERIENCED RECENTLY

me: can you?? rest??? stop making this JUST LIKE HEAVEN STARRING MARK RUFFALO AND REESE WITHERSPOON CONNECTION BETWEEN STRESS AND TRAUMA

yes that is a thomas sanders deep cut. AhhHhHHH-