SunChips Go Compostable, Week 11

I was out of town last week. I took a trip to California to watch the first few stages of the Tour of California and then spend a few days in Napa Valley. So no update for Week 10, but as you can see, there's not much change.

The staked bag has changed very little, if at all. It has been lying on the ground in fairly hot, dry Arizona conditions. It has been in the 90s, no rain, etc. As you can see, even a compostable bag might last a very, very long time as "litter." The bag has been staked out for three weeks now.

A new edition to my compost experiments is a cup my daughter brought to me from Quiznos. Quiznos is trying to hop on the "Green" band wagon. I have to give them some credit for that, though I doubt very, very few will ever end up in a composting system. I know of at least one, however. We'll see how long it lasts. I do wonder what type of coating has been used to make the cup hold liquid better than plain paper would. It's probably not wax, since that would make composting problematic. I haven't done any research into this but it is probably sprayed with a plant-based coating of some sort.

We have two bags going in the bin. The original bag has been cooking for eleven weeks now. Like I said, the first several weeks were not under optimal conditions. The last few weeks have been under better composting conditions, but probably not commercial quality, very controlled conditions. I knew from the beginning that the estimated fourteen weeks would be unrealistic in my back yard. I think the second bag will break down more quickly because it was started in the tumbling composter as opposed to my "holding bin" composter. But we'll see.

I've attached a short video that compares the two bags by sound as well as feel. Not a lot of difference, but it is there.

For what it's worth, this is where we're at with what has become a new hobby of sorts--composting things that claim to be compostable. We'll see what happens when I come across some compostable plastic table ware. I'm not going to go out and buy some just to see what happens, but if I see some being used, I'll try to grab some.

Until next week, get that dirt cooking!

SunChips Go Compostable, Week 10 / Week 01

A lot going on, and very little, all at the same time! Like I said, I made the switch to the tumbler along with a fresh bag. I also staked out a new bag to just see what happens to it when it's simply exposed to the elements, such as being tossed out a car window and landing in the ditch.

Things in the ditch in Arizona don't necessarily break down the way they might in Michigan, for instance. Or Alabama. Conditions are dry and hot so unless something will readily degrade from heat or sunlight, it might sit around for years and years. Even banana peels have a way of lasting far longer than you might think. I don't know how many times I've been out riding my bike and noticed strips of what I call "banana leather" along the road from other cyclists who toss them to the side thinking they will quickly biodegrade. There aren't too many critters out there that will eat the bitter peel of a banana.

If you look at the picture above you will see the original bag on the left and the new bag on the right. Other than the one on the left looking dirtier, there doesn't appear to be much difference. The differences are subtle and you can't much see them in the picture, but if there was audio (I might do this sometime!) you'd hear a difference in the crinkle factor.

There probably won't be an update next week because of the Tour of California, but hopefully there will be a few ToC updates in its place!

My First Batch of "Tumbled" Compost

It has been eleven weeks since I completed my home made compost tumbler. The other day I decided that since I was wearing a pair of rubber gloves I would reach into the tumbler and test the consistency of the compost. I had noticed that (almost overnight) the tumbler was spinning easily and felt much lighter than it had when I started. I have always read that compost should be the consistency of a wet sponge that has been lightly wrung, but I'd never actually groped my gross gruel to check--I just figured as long as it was steaming away, it was probably "cooking" pretty well.

What I found was that I had a tumbler full of nicely finished humus-like compost! Rich, black, and chock full of nutrients, I put a handful on my screen and rubbed it through. It was finally done!

I hadn't planned on it, but I ended up emptying the contents of the tumbler, screening the compost, and filling a storage tub with the black gold-standard of garden goodness. As with any home made compost, there were a few things in there that wouldn't screen through. I found a few small rocks (?!?!), which I tossed to the side. There were some mango pits, which I put back into the bin, figuring they would eventually break down in subsequent rounds. The same for some avocado pits and not-quite-broken-down squash stems and things like that. There were some avocado skins that still looked like avocado skins, but they crumbled pretty easily and most went through my screen accordingly. Anything that didn't screen that I determined to be "eventually compostable" went back into the bin for the next cycle.

I found some interesting things besides the rocks though! The picture above isn't everything, but it's a representative sample. What are those things? I asked myself the same question while I was sifting the compost, but I finally figured it out. Those plastic sleeves? Well, I am 99.99% positive they are the linings of oatmeal and tea bag packets! Those instant oatmeal packets and the paper wrappers around tea bags are apparently lined with some pretty durable stuff. Hopefully it doesn't leach into our food too much! I also found several small strips of clear plastic (you can see one in the picture). I knew almost immediately what those were--the remains of a shredded debit card! I knew a few pieces of it went into the bin at some point when I was adding shredded paper. The interesting thing is that all I found were the little strips of clear plastic, which means the rest of the card--the colored plastic, etc., is apparently made of some kind of biodegradable plastic. Cool! What's that other chunk, though? It is one of two synthetic corks that I found in the mix, somewhat broken down, but generally recognizable.

In the end the compost is nice. It should drain pretty well because there some pistachio shells mixed throughout that didn't break down much at all. I suspect there are still some more or less viable squash seeds in there that might sprout, but those are easy to spot and eliminate should it come to that.

I am quite pleased with the results and am looking forward to having a second tumbler in the future. My friend Ryan, who supplied the first barrel, is keeping an eye out for a second barrel for me.That way my compost will work on a nice schedule of filling and tumbling one barrel till it's "full," then letting it just tumble and cure and finish while the second barrel moves into filling and tumbling mode (after yielding excellent compost, of course).

I am still amazed that the kitchen sCRAPs and miscellaneous things like toilet paper tubes and shredded paper bags from sandwich shops and weeds from the yard can turn into something like this. I know there are some cities out there that have implemented curbside composting (some of them mandatory!) and can only imagine how great it would be if every community did this. So much usable waste goes into the landfill where, at best, it will, hopefully, yield some usable methane that could more immediately be used to propagate growth and nourish food crops and maybe, just maybe, eliminate some of the unnecessary and harmful use of artificial nitrogen-based fertilizers.

SunChips Go Compostable, Week 08 and 09

Well, there was no significant progress during week eight so I didn't bother posting. Week nine, to be honest, is much different. There are some developments to report, however.

First of all, I received a bag of free SunChips in the mail! SunChips followed through with their promise to send me some free chips for my posts. I expected a coupon for a free bag, but instead I received a large box with a bag of chips inside it. Now, seriously, if the goal is to be environmentally friendly, why would you send a box in the mail when a small envelope with a coupon in it would work just as well? I shouldn't dog them too much because, hey, they sent me free chips. I just don't think it was the best way to do it. They did use some shredded paper as packing material, but it looked like the brightly colored shredded stuff that is bought specifically for that purpose, not shredded newspapers or scrap. At least it wasn't polystyrene packing peanuts.

I have finally moved the bag to the tumbler. I have also put in two "fresh" empty bags in at the same time. It will be interesting to see how long it takes for bags in an a more ideal composting environment to break down. We'll see how we do compared to the official fourteen week estimate. As I write this I had another idea, too. I think I'm going to take one of those two new bags and pin it down to the ground next to the composter and just leave it out in the open. This will give us an idea of how long the new compostable bag takes to breakdown when some idiot decides to toss it out the car window and it ends up on the side of the road somewhere. I'll track that, too, I think!

I guess if I have moved the bag to the tumbler that means my first batch of compost must be finished, right? Right! I'll talk more about that in a separate post. It did a great job, though, I'll tell you that!

SunChips Go Compostable, Week 07

Well, we're at the estimated half way point and it doesn't seem like a whole lot of progress has been made. Now, again, I remind you--this first bag is not being composted under ideal conditions and will very likely take twice as long as predicted. We'll see. As soon as the batch of compost in the tumbler is ready then I will start a fresh bag in the tumbler (along with this one, if it's still being broken down) and get a more favorable reading on the estimate given by Frito-Lay.

In the meantime, if you're not composting START NOW!

Growing Hops

Everyone the world round knows that the one thing you need to brew a good batch of beer is a good batch of hops. Especially of you like the good hoppy beers, like an Indian Pale Ale. My son-in-law has been brewing beer for a little while now and has been brewing some top notch American Ale and a few other varieties (including a stout I liked). He has quickly moved from bottling his beer to kegging it and trying a variety of brewing methods. The next logical step is to grow his own hops! (We're probably out of luck when he decides he'd like to start farming barley here in Tucson, but you never know.)

Hops is a rhizomatic plant, not unlike mint or strawberry in that sense--if you have ever grown either of those plants you'll know they can spread like crazy if you don't set some boundaries. For that reason it's pretty easy to propagate--you just cut off pieces of the rhizome and root it. Pretty soon you'll have a hop plant. I'm not saying hops doesn't require certain conditions--it does. It likes heat. It likes water. It likes sun. It likes well-drained soil. Water and well-drained soil aren't typical qualities of Tucson dirt. But you can mimic almost anything in a pot.

Freddie ordered up six rhizomes, two each of three varieties (I think--I could be wrong on the quantities & varieties!). Cascade, probably one of the most popular hops varieties used in brewing, was of course in the mix. He also ordered Willamette and Magnum varieties. There may have been another variety, but I'm not sure. Rather than try to grow them all himself, he divied them up--two at my house, two at his aunt's house, two at his house, etc. I received two rhizomes, Cascade and Willamette. I potted them in twelve inch pots with a well-draining soil mix on top of a base of volcanic rock for ensured drainage. Normally a hop plant can root up to fifteen feet, so I hope it doesn't get root bound in the pot. If it looks like that might happen, we can always get a larger pot, but it will simply be wider, not necessarily deeper. We could try to plant it in the ground, but it's much easier to control moisture within the confines of a pot.

It has been three weeks and I now have plants. The Willamette came up first and it is about three or four inches tall. The Cascade was a week or so behind the Willamette and it is only about an inch above the surface. Hops is a natural climber so we have decided to drop twine from the roofline and let the plants climb up that (after some initial training, of course). We haven't dropped the twine yet, but I'm thinking we'd better do it before it gets too hot out--I'm in no hurry to go shimmying around a tile roof when it's a hundred degrees out.

I'll be giving hops updates as it seems appropriate. We probably won't be harvesting any this year, though. If I understand it correctly, generally the first year is more about establishing the plant than it is about harvesting. We might get a few buds to work with. It would be cool if Freddie was able to harvest enough this year for at least one batch of beer. Maybe he'll be able to use his own home grown hops in his Belgium style wheat beer infused with his own home grown lavendar!

SunChips Go Compostable, Week 06

It's week six and the bag is still whole and even a little crinkly. I added a bunch of weeds from the yard this week so there's a lot more moisture and with the temperatures rising I suspect things are going to happen a little more quickly in the coming weeks. My tumbler is still not "finished," so I am thinking that I might add a new bag to the tumbler when it comes time to add a new batch to it. This bag might still be in the works when that happens, but it'll be interesting to see if the progress is any faster when it's in a proper composting environment from day one rather than starting it's compost life in a staging bin that isn't necessarily ideal composting conditions.

One thing is for sure, the tumbler is doing a nice job or converting the stuff that's in there. I think it'll be my first batch of real "quality" compost. That is, the best break down of larger pieces, even "burning," and general break down into soil-like compost.