Tools Can Make Composting Easier

We resolve to be more environmentally conscious, yet when it adds work to our lives, a lot of us lose interest. Take composting. The trick is to get stuff decomposing as quickly as you deposit it. Among other things, you have to stir the material to keep the process moving.

It's work, but with yard and food waste making up 30 percent of what a typical family throws out, it's worth doing. Having a composter that looks good and is easy to use is a positive step.

-- Homemade is cheaper: Whether you use discarded wooden pallets or wire fencing and plastic posts from the home center, building your own composter is the least expensive option, from nothing to under $25. But do-it-yourself composters aren't much to look at, so folks put them far from the house. Out of sight, out of use.

-- Factory-made looks better: Prices range from about $40 to $500 for more attractive and user-friendly varieties -- incentives to keep them handy and full.

-- Choices, choices: Less-expensive models, such as polyethelene plastic and heavy-gauge wire-coated steel bins (about $40), are simple to set up. One plastic model holds 27 cubic feet of leaves and will open up to allow easy access. A wire composting bin holds about 16 cubic feet of leaves.

-- Tough talk: For about $70, you can buy a heavy-duty plastic composter that snaps together quickly. The top opens for depositing material, then closes to hold in the heat. When the compost is ready, there are doors to get at it. Go up in price, to $169, for a unit topped with a pyramid that lets in rain for keeping compost moist.

Priced at $250, the Earthmaker is a three-chamber affair, with waste deposited at the top for initial decomposition. After a few weeks, a panel separating it from the second chamber can be slid open, and the compost drops into a cooler area. Another shelf slides open and sends finished compost to the bottom.

-- Keep it inside: The electric NatureMill composter ($300) is billed as able to handle 120 pounds of food scraps monthly. Scraps are placed in the top chamber, where a composting culture begins to break them down; the electricity runs a grinder and heater. Norpro makes two versions of indoor compost-storage bins: ceramic ($25) and stainless steel ($70).

-- Roll out the barrels: PBM Group makes back-porch compost tumblers ($250) that require some assembly and come with wheels that make them easy to position. A snap locks the opening. Just unlatch it, drop waste in and close it; spin for more even composting. Envirocycle's barrel composter ($140) sits on a stand. Achla's spinning composters are top-loaded barrels or front-loaded horizontals ($200). The Tumbleweed barrel composter ($180) is loaded, covered and then spun. Urban Composter's Uct-9 ($250) is heavy-duty plastic and looks like a Civil War trench mortar.