WSARE 2000 Farmer/Rancher Grants-FW00-022

TITLE: Rotating Vessel Composter for Small Farms

A rotating vessel composter

Jack Caldicott is the owner of Jacyn Lavender and Vegetable Farm, a small-scale farm in western Washington. He relies almost exclusively on farm-generated compost and cover crops to build up and maintain soil fertility. Caldicott's compost is made in bins that must be turned regularly. This work is time consuming and difficult. Continuously rotating drum composting systems have been developed; however, they have been targeted to large-scale facilities and not small-scale farmers. According to Caldicott, small-scale hand turned drum composting has been tried but does not produce as good compost as the 4'X 4'X 4' bins. With the help of a Western SARE Farmer/Rancher Research grant, Caldicott will design and build his own continuously rotating drum composting system and test its effectiveness.

Designing, prototyping, and testing the composter will comprise the first part of the project. Caldicott plans to test different types of low-cost material for the composter. He also wants to try using an elevated water supply to provide hydraulic power to rotate the drum. During these tests, he will monitor the temperature of the composting material to ensure that weed seeds and pathogens are eliminated. Then Caldicott will establish test plots for the compost and have the compost tested to determine its chemical makeup. Salad greens will be planted in the test plots, and their germination and harvest time as well as productivity will be evaluated. Finally, the drawings for the composter will be revised according to these findings.

Caldicott will share his findings with participants in the Clallam County Sustainable Farming Program and with other local farmers. If the design proves successful, a demonstration unit will be built for the Robin Hill Farm Sustainable Agriculture demonstration project, which is open to the general public.