Stackable Cedar Compost Bin

My wife is a big gardener and backyard composting fan. Anna mentioned she wanted a movable compost bin that was roughly three feet cubed. This spring I thought I would try to put something together that would last and make "the pile" look a little more visually appealing.

Cedar Compost Bin Design

For the general design of the compost bin I thought I would stick with the same cedar design I used previously for some raised strawberry beds I put in a couple years ago. We talked about using treated

pine instead of cedar this time around but the whole idea of composting in wood that had been treated with what is effectively rat poison was a non starter. Like the raised beds the main building materials were cedar deck boards, 4x4s, and 2x4s.

Since the idea was to make the bin movable it needed to be light enough to pick up, or at least made of sections that could be moved. I ended up breaking the bin into three stackable pieces: one base section and two identical upper, stackable sections.

To hold the parts together I used some Titlebond extieror wood glue along with exterior deck screws (lots of them). I think if you were on a budget, wood glue plus galvanized nails would work but I really wanted to make sure the assembled sections would hold up when they were being moved around the back yard.

Base Compost Bin Section

The front of the bin needed to be open so it would be easy to shovel stuff in and out. That was a challenge because with the fourth wall missing in the square the side walls could end up being flimsy. To get around that I used a Cedar 2x4 laid flat (see lower, front most board in picture to the left) with some triangle supports to anchor the side walls together. The 2x4 would support the side walls and still be low enough to not impede shoveling compost in and out of the bin.

The corner post where 14" sections of cedar 4x4. The side wall panels were standard cedar decking layered side by side for a total height of 12" (see the raised beds article for details, the same method was used for this compost bin). The triangle supports used in the corners were made from the leftovers.