Trial of new 200 litre compost bin

New 200 litre compost bin – a bit (~ 100mm) wider than a milk crate Today we began trialling a new 200 litre compost bin made by Aerobin.  It’s half the size of their 400 litre bin.  It’s footprint is half the size, too:  it’s 510mm x 510mm x 1175mm high.  To my eyes it’s more elegant.  It’s smaller size increases the range of locations it may go into.   It looks as though it will aerate the compost more effectively than the 400 litre bin and prove more... Read More

Composting on the frontier

In Chippo we have public compost bins on our road gardens.   Friday and Saturday nights – pub nights – sometimes bring the urban galah, alcohol and our bins together.  About a month ago an urban galah or two tipped over two bins and damaged them. Michael with two heavy duty tapes screwed around the bins – sorry about the poor photo in the poor evening light Today, a new gardener who’s just moved into Myrtle Street, Michael, worked with me to strap... Read More

Kids garden in the roads

Kids harvesting tucker from road gardens Last week some 5 and 6 year old kids from a local child care centre came a-gardening with me and their parents and carers in Chippendale’s streets. They harvested lemon grass, nasturtium flowers and leaves, lemon tea tree, bay leaves, caffre lime leaves and, more than that, some ancient connections with food.   Marie, child care cook, using public compost bins The cook at the child care centre walks with the kids from the centre... Read More

Frankston Council shows leadership with rate rebate for composting

Frankston Council, Victoria, has a run-away success with it’s rate rebate for composting program, Halve Garbage.   The designer of the program, Alison Winn, says: “I originally designed the ‘Halve Garbage Waste’ program and secured a $100 000 grant to roll out a smaller garbage bin service to residents.  Residents who signed up received either a compost bin or a worm farm and a $20 rate reduction.  I think the smaller bin was a 60L bin.  The program incorporated... Read More

Free mulch, free spring and other positives

Free mulch – Australia-wide While in Fremantle recently –  a very beautiful place to walk around – I met Tim Lawrence, whose business, MulchNet, provides free mulch across Australia. No catch here, just someone using imagination and wit. It works like this:  most landscaping and other mulch-making businesses have to pay to take the mulch to the tip if they can’t find a way to make it useful.  MulchNet allows anyone in any Australian state to register... Read More

What kind of sewage system?

Comes this question from yesterday’s tour: HI Michael Thanks for the tour yesterday, was great to see your systems in action! I have a quick question about the sewerage which I forgot to ask: What do you think about composting toilets v. your system for an innner city context such as yours? Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks Cheers Sarah   My answer: Great question; thank you. A composting toilet was not an option on my small inner city terrace site because: it... Read More

Simple compost solution, and a paw paw tree goes North

Chippo paw paw replanted north side of Harbour Bridge Two things from today’s road gardening; a paw paw tree goes north; and a new simple way to compost was swapped. For this Friday’s gardening, Janet and friends came across the Harbour Bridge to join us.  Lots of ‘We do this . . “, and “How do you find this goes . . “, as we swapped stories of what works and doesn’t. Together we planted:  chives, vietnamese mint, lemon grass, rhubarb,... Read More

The Sustainable Communities Plan is on the web

Sydney City Council asked me to make a plan to make the whole suburb of Chippendale sustainable. It’s not just a plan for this suburb; it can be used to make any suburb sustainable – it’s free and you’re welcome to put it to work where you are. Now the Plan can be read on mobiles, kindles and is very easy to search, use and tweet.  Get it here: theplan.sustainablehouse.com… Enjoy. You can see some of the folks who support the Plan. Please sign the... Read More

Another day, another composter

Got home tonight to find this lovely email:   Hi Michael, I’ve seen you today giving a presentation to Canon employees. It was a very good one and it certainly made people think about the energy and water being wasted in our everyday lives. Many thanks! I would like to let you know my thoughts on coffee grounds composting. Many small, local cafes do not produce enough coffee grounds to make farmers interested in reusing them (as in your example) so they need to pay... Read More

Green Building Council office compost onto our road gardens

Geoff, Green Building Council compost and road verge Today Geoff and I picked up three bags of compost from the Elizabeth Street offices of the Green Building Council.  For info about the Council:   www.gbca.org….au   Two fellows, Toufik Refki and Jeff Oatman were waiting on the footpath with the compost in hessian sacks ready for loading into Geoff’s van.   Loaded up, Geoff and I went straight to the area most in need, the road verge outside the units... Read More