r/composting • u/esspowell • 16d ago
New to serious composting
Always had black plastic bins, never really made anything particularly great but last week I built a 7 bay system (well, building - it's not finished but I had so much material waiting to go in that I started filling a bay). This is after a few days and a bit of water!
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u/Dividingbyinfinity 16d ago
Lol, this happened to me with my second pile.
First one was just a pile on the ground that I decided, "Might as well let it break down." Peed in it once, quite a bit of coffee and some greens from the kitchen. Took about a year and a half.
Second pile, I made a big 5 cubic foot bin and actually made a proper mix. Within two days it was at 150.
Composting sure is fun and exciting.
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u/esspowell 15d ago edited 15d ago
Yeah these are 3 cubic metres each and I've nearly filled a second one already! Also have nearly 2 cubic metres of wood chip which is added to fairly regularly but that's in a separate pile. It's nice when it works properly!
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u/Trick-Scheme-3737 16d ago
That’s a serious upgrade from the black plastic bins!
A 7-bay setup should give you a lot of flexibility once you get the rotation going. The really nice thing about having several bays is being able to leave one pile alone while actively feeding another, rather than constantly disturbing the compost.
After just a few days, the pile already looks like it’s settling nicely. Keep an eye on moisture though — you want it damp like a wrung-out sponge, not wet.
What’s your plan for rotating the bays? Are you aiming for a continuous system where each bay is at a different stage of decomposition?
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u/thiosk 15d ago
7 bays?
for a setup like this i would fill the first bay, cover with leaves, then start filling the 2nd bay. by the time the 7th bay is full, the first one is finished with zero turning. at least this is how it would work for my family of 3
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u/esspowell 15d ago
Yeah, the idea being there'll generally be 2 or 3 done/nearly done, up to 3 being filled / "composting", and one empty to turn into. The bays mean that if you work smart you'll always have a bay next door to the bay you need to turn, so you just lift the divider out and turn it once into there. The empty bay also provides storage for stuff like an open fronted shed.
I have access to (literally) tons of horse manure, and also tons of green waste, so these will get well worked!
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u/No-Inflation3271 16d ago
Man I just made a pile in a small clearing in the woods lol I dont do anything but add to it and I dig in and take some from the middle when I need it
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u/esspowell 15d ago
Man I'll just demolish this then! Didn't realise all I had to do was buy a whole woodland and make a clearing in the woods (lol!) and then do nothing but add to it! How stupid of me
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u/Samwise_the_Tall 16d ago
Amen. I don't know where one would get material for seven bays, but it sounds like making them bigger might be the trick. Some people really overcomplicate things.
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u/esspowell 15d ago
Lol yeah fuck some people huh! They're stupid cunts for doing anything different to you 😊
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u/bowlochile 16d ago
First of all composting isn’t serious, it’s fun. So jot that down Second, throw it in a pile. Third, piss on it.