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I am currently in my last semester studying product design at the University of Cincinnati. For my final project, I am creating a backyard compost system. This system aims to help suburban households start and maintain a compost pile in their backyard, thus eliminating about 28% of household waste from being landfilled. I have created a short survey (about 5 minutes long) about the styling and features of the system. I am looking for feedback and concept validation.
Please click the link below to complete this quick survey.
Thank you!
The link works if you copy & paste it but erase the pre- & post- parenthetic "url".
Just curious-- who, living in a city/suburban setting, would need a "system" this big? How long would it take to fill it? We only produce ~ a pint of table scraps each day and that's run thru the chickens first before it winds up in the manure pile. (No need to wash dishes-- the dogs lick 'em clean Even with a horse, two minis and 2 dz chickens, the yearly manure production wouldn't fill these.
I'm impressed with the aesthetics of all three systems if you live in civilization with a more or less formal garden/yard. Nice job...Maybe a lower profile?...Here with acreage in The Sticks, our system is just a pile on the ground.
I did take the survey and it really pretty minimal, IMO.
I did build a small compost container in our back yard in a small wooded area and although we are only two people, we do generate a fair amount of food scraps. We eat fresh vegetables on a daily basis so we have some of those scraps daily as well as tea bags, coffee grounds, egg shells and other items.
We believe it’s better to keep as much as possible out of the landfills while sending nutrients back into the soil that can be reused. Why create more waste unnecessarily?
I graduated from UC (1975) so I HAD to complete this! As Rickcon said it's pretty straightforward and doesn't take long to complete.
Right now I just have two piles in different areas of my back yard. Critters don't seem to be a problem but the only food items I put out are egg shells, coffee grounds and soggy veggies left over after I make vegetable broth from the fibrous ends of vegetables that I cut off when preparing them.
Fortunately I have a recycling place a few miles away that takes large cuttings- branches, etc- for $5 a bag. They run it through a chipper, let it sit and then sell as compost. They require that you NOT leave the paper lawn/leaf bags there so I re-use them as many times as I can.
...They run it through a chipper, let it sit and then sell as compost. \
Gardeners looking for great compost/seed starting medium should visit any nearby commercial riding stable. They usually have a mountain of manure/pine bedding self composting itself available for free. Take a shovel & buckets or pet food bags to fill....If left sitting long enough, it turns into essentially the best humus...But it's even better when it's still not yet completely decomposed to dust-- the fibrous nature is the perfect texture for maximizing water & nutrient absorption by the plants.
It gets very hot in a manure pile- The pine shavings are reduced to ashes and the heat kills any residual weed seeds.
I have five acres and simply made piles of leaves and vegetation. Every year I would start off with about two triaxles piles of leaves and straw (from our duck bedding) and in about three to four years I would get back about one quarter of that in good rich dark compost. I just started another pile each year. It wasn't fancy; but I have a lot of good black dirt to show for my effort. I did add lime to these piles as they grew in size while adding the leaves and straw. If I had anybody do backhoe work I would have them turn the piles and that helped break down the straw.
I took the survey, but it was more about what a composter looks like than the actual workings, so I saw little value in it.
Our composter is a round, black ball a bout 36" in diameter (we call it the Death Star). Makes it easy to turn the pile; one simply rolls it around for a bit. We stopped using the big pile method when we stopped picking up leaves. They just get mulched in place, along with the grass, via mulching mower blades. So all that goes into the compost now are coffee grounds, tea leaves, egg shells (albumin rinsed off), fruits and vegetables, and sometimes grains. We occasionally add some manure from the llamas next door to heat things up. Then every few months, we empty it into the garden.
Thank you all for taking my survey and I appreciate the feedback. The survey was indeed mostly focused on aesthetics and my project is focused on suburban dwellers who do not want to have exposed piles in their backyard. I know this system isn't a solution for everyone, I'm just trying to create an option for people interested in starting to backyard compost. The pieces would be available individually, so if someone only wanted one bin and a sifter, tat's what they could get. As far as the overall footprint of the system, I wanted to ensure that each bin was large enough to meet the standard 3' x 3' recommended pile size.
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