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In response to our friend Marilyn, who in response
to our previous web-posting wrote:
One thing you must clarify: humanure.
Is this what I think it is? Too funny
the following info sheds a bit more light on this fascinating subject!
According to Joseph Jenkins, author of "The Humanure Handbook",
the world is divided into two categories of people: those who shit
in drinking water, and those who don't.
| Here's our (unused) septic tank. This is
the way it works: you flush the toilet and several gallons of
fresh drinking water carry the feces and urine ("poo and
pee" if you prefer) into the tank, where the solids sink
to the bottom. The polluted liquid drains out into the "leach
field", a few inches below the surface of the ground. Systems
used in towns and cities are similar, but on a larger scale, with
our bodily by-products piped to treatment plants. After chlorination,
the effluent is often piped into our lakes and oceans. |
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Alain and I decided that, in keeping with
the spirit of alternative, sustainable, responsible and healthful
living at Straw Hollow, we wanted to look for an alternative method
of dealing with our crap with a minimum of fuss or expense, and
a maximum of common sense. Our first option was to spend $2000
on a composting toilet, but then we found something 100 times
cheaper... the Humanure Handbook! |
| So, we took our old outhouse, made a few
alterations, and now we are the proud owners of a smart, clean,
odour free, Humanure Hut! This is how it works:
beneath a normal looking toilet seat is a 50-litre plastic bucket.
One covers one's "deposit" with a cup or two of odor-and-moisture
absorbing peat moss. When the bucket is full, it is dumped into
one of three specially built compost bins, along with other compostable
materials (vegetable peelings, grass cuttings, etc) and the magic
of thermophilic composting takes over. |
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Composting requires no electricity and produces
no waste or pollutants. The naturally occurring microorganisms
destroy human disease pathogens, and the humanure is converted
to a clean, safe humus, suitable as an additive for flower
beds, and yes, even 100% safe for the veggie garden. The bottom
line is that our natural by-products are not "waste"...
they're a valuable resource suitable for agricultural purposes
and have been recycled for such purposes by large segments of
the world's human population for thousands of years. |
We don't really expect all readers of this
page to embrace this practice, or even take it seriously, but
with depleted water tables and water shortages in the USA, humanure
composting will one day become standard, acceptable practice.
So please keep an open mind, and if you're in the neighbourhood,
feel free to drop by and make a deposit in our Humanure Hut!
(Note to the queasy reader who might be looking at visiting us
this summer: It takes about three years before the compost is
ready for application to the veggie patch) |
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