the best homemade compost bin

Last winter (and it was a brutal thing) as I twiddled my thumbs waiting for my berries to thaw, I came across this site:

Vegetable Gardening With Lorraine

What a brilliant design for a compost bin.  Each of the horizontals is a self-contained unit that stacks into the unit beneath and above.  It’s a project that takes a little carpentry, but not too difficult for a beginner.  I’d add try to be accurate with measurements, but there’s still a little leeway.  I bought enough cedar to make two bins with some extra for slop, which became two additional units (on the left).

In the spring a friend let me clean out her horse stalls.  Having a trailer full of horse manure and bedding is truly one of the greatest joys of my life.

By the end of the summer, turning the pile frequently (another joy), the manure had turned into gorgeous black stuff that went on my late summer garden before the cover crop was planted.

Steamy goodness.