Bucket for Gardening - Banana Peels to Butterflies

What do a 5-gallon bucket, passion for gardening, and love of coffee all have in common? Answer - compost and convenience. I'm always looking for ways to minimize what I send to the landfill and one of the easiest ways for me to do this is to compost as much as I can from the kitchen. An added benefit is that compost enriches the garden soils, which in turn reward me with beautiful blooms that attract butterflies, honeybees, and hummingbirds.

Coffee grounds and paper filters, egg shells and cardboard cartons, veggies, fruit and much more accumulate quickly. How could I avoid making daily trips, especially during the winter, to the compost area of our yard more than 300 feet from the house?

Enter an unused 5-gallon plastic bucket with handle and lid, which we originally purchased for doing a house project. I add the food scraps to the pot under the kitchen sink and empty it when full, usually in a day or two, into the bucket I keep in the utility room. Every 7-10 days, when this bucket is more than half full and quite heavy, I take a walk to the compost area in the lower yard, where I add it and turn the active compost pile.

One half of the compost space is 'resting' and the other half is 'active'. Using this setup, I have fresh, loamy compost ready to use in 6-8 weeks. This humble bucket is an integral part of the compost setup in my home; I know I wouldn't compost nearly as much as I do because of the inconvenience of walking the mulch out daily. I amend the soil in the flower and herb gardens with the kitchen compost and the results are amazing.