--- In [EMAIL PROTECTED], Keith Addison <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> Perfectly safe, if you do it right. Entire populations have used the
> sanitizing effects of topsoil for this, and grown their crops on it,
> through many generations, without ill-effects, and still do.
> Hot-composting makes sure of that, and improves the effectiveness of
> the product.
I think the problem here is it just gets too cold in Winter -- when
you put the bucket of kitchen waste out on the heap, it freezes solid
before it has a chance to start working. Even here in central WI it
does that, in northern MN where we did a lot more composting, it was
frozen solid from about Nov. 1 -- mid-May, just like the ground. I
suppose if you had a large batch of materials mixed up properly with
the correct ratios, it might have a chance, but you can't do that with
the daily wastes. And really, my compost piles here are more worm-bins
than real compost, I don't think they ever heat up much. Not enough
nitrogen for one thing, here in town. And when we had animals up in
MN, we always just put manure straight on the garden.
I wish the humanure book had been out then, we really had a problem
in the Winter. Our outhouse would always freeze, as we got a lot of
heavy rain in Fall, and it was heavy clay soil, so the outhouse hole
would fill to ground level with water, then freeze solid. So you'd
have a very small space left which filled rapidly. Several Winters we
ended up having to just use a chamber pot and empty it into a 55gal
drum, and although we added leaves and wood ashes in there to try to
get it working, it just froze solid too. When it doesn't get above
zero F. for weeks at a time, things don't get a chance to start
breaking down and creating any heat. Up there you'd find piles of snow
in the woods well into June, and the lakes never opened up before
mid-May, and the Forestry wouldn't allow road work until June.
Somewhere I've seen plans for a solar heated outhouse, and solar
heated compost bin, which would probably be the ticket. I tried, as I
said, making compost in a plastic barrel in the greenhouse this last
Winter, but it just didn't get enough air, I think, too much water,
even tho I added dry leaves, and not enough nitrogen. I'll try
something different next year.
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