This wasn’t originally going to be a post, but since we’ve had quite the trials, I thought we’d share in hopes of helping someone else, even if it’s just for a good laugh.

Most of the dirt on our property is clay. It doesn’t absorb water quickly; thus, it’s a major contributor to the land’s erosion problems. The terrain is very hilly with many steep slopes. Finding flat sites for a future home site was no easy feat; we discovered only one, and that’s where the house will go. We had to create a flat site for the Morton, so it’s fair to say our future garden/food plots will definitely be on a grade.

Building our modern homestead has been and forever will be a process. We have time on our side, and now that we have a driveway, we decided it was a perfect time to start our compost operation. We eat a lot of fresh fruits and veggies and always have lots of kitchen scraps. Our property is woodland and never has a shortage of dried leaves. A perfect match!

We wanted to start enriching the clay dirt, slowly turning it into soil and preparing it for future bounty. We decided to set up a simple, 3-bin composter very near where our future vegetable garden is planned. Proximity was important because we needed easy access to both drop raw materials off and utilize the finished compost. We chose a prefabricated, untreated cedar product because it’s naturally rot- and pest-resistant. It was also an easy, tool-free assembly, and the wood slats are easily removable for design flexibility.

If our composting process wasn’t going to be easy to do, we’d be less likely to stick to it. So I placed a small bin in our kitchen next to the trash to collect scraps, and I put a larger bin in our garage into which we dump the small bin. The plan was to take the larger bin from our garage every time we went to the property and add it to the compost. Simple enough.

I had a little fun with the composter and got creative. Instead of moving the compost pile through each of the three bins, as is the norm in such a system, I decided to go the lazy way and use each bin from start to finish; add scraps to one bin until it’s full, let it sit (and turn) in place, and start adding scraps into another bin. The only trick to that is knowing which bin we’re supposed to dump kitchen waste into at any given time.

So, I had a metal fabricator we’d hired before make us three powder coated steel signs that read: “ADD SCRAPS,” “LET COOK, and “USE COMPOST.” I then affixed magnets to one wood slat in each bin. The magnets hold the signs, which will be moved from bin to bin as we progress through the stages of compost.

Finally, we had our systems in place at home and at the property. Time to compost! We put a nice layer of leaves and twigs down first, dropped our first bucket of kitchen waste in, and topped it with another layer of dried leaves and sticks. Another plan we had talked about for years had come to fruition, and it was only a matter of time until we had loads of rich compost to begin our garden. Looking back, it is funny how naive we were just a few short months ago.

The next time we went to the property, we took our collection bin from the garage to add to the developing compost heap. When we arrived, the bin was empty. Completely barren, not even a leaf left behind. Thieves! Footprints covered every side of the composter; I can’t imagine how many trips it must’ve taken up and over to completely empty out the bin. How silly of us to the think the creatures we share our property with wouldn’t want corn husks, rotting melon rinds, and old flour. So we started over: new layer of dried leaves and sticks, new bucket of kitchen scraps, another layer of leaves, and a temporary lid we fashioned from materials we scrounged up around our building.

The next time we visited our property was only a day or two later, so we didn’t have anything new to add to the compost, but we decided to check how our lid was holding up. As we approached, we could see the lid was intact and footprints covered the top. Upon closer inspection, we saw the bin had been emptied entirely. Not a single leaf left, yet again. Thieves! A small hole was dug under the back side of that first bin. Again, we couldn’t imagine how many trips it must’ve taken underneath to empty everything out.

Time for a new plan. We want sunlight and rain to reach the compost, and we also need good air circulation through the pile. So we needed a bottom and a top that would allow air, water, and light through but would keep raccoons out. How do we know raccoons are the thieves? After this next attempt, we put a trail camera on the composter to watch the attempted robberies and get mug shots of the criminals, of course.

We settled on vinyl-coated chicken wire because it’s relatively inexpensive and it’s less likely to rust through since it would be sitting on the ground, functioning as a bottom to our composter. We secured the bottom layer of wire with metal plates, washers, screws, and numerous wire fasteners along all the edges.

Next, we restarted the compost pile for the third time and added the same chicken wire to the top. We needed the top to be more accessible in order to continue to add and turn the waste, so we just secured it with wire fasteners in twist tie fashion.

We set a trail camera on the bin and hoped for the best. A new hole was dug underneath with no luck, but just as many cinematic heists are carefully orchestrated, four raccoons worked together to climb on top of the wire, causing it to sag, and stretching it just far enough to create a gap along the edge of the top for them to get in and out of. They cleaned us out entirely for the third time.

Our fourth, and most recent, attempt addressed the prior point of weakness: the lid. We still wanted air, light, and water to penetrate the top, but we needed the edges to be stronger and we wanted it to be more accessible to us humans. I drew up a sketch and started acquiring materials: untreated cedar boards, hinges, screws, and latches. Then, we built the lid, sandwiching the wire between cedar boards, reducing its ability to stretch and eliminating the ability to create gaps along the edge.

Next, we affixed the lid using 4 hinges along the back edge and added two latches to the front.

After completion of the lid, we once again layered leaves and kitchen scraps in the first bin for our fourth attempt at composting. As we left our property that day, I began anticipating the burglars’ next move. I envision a new hole to be dug, with the undeterred thieves camped underneath, relentlessly pawing through the wire, grasping one small scrap at a time. I decided to return the next day to slide that initial temporary lid (scrap piece of plywood) under the first bin.

Sure enough, when I arrived the following day, good-sized holes had been dug under the front and back of the composter, but to my surprise, much of what we had placed inside the day before was still there. I’m sure we’ll have more adjustments to make as time goes on, but for now, we’ll call it a win.

Damn raccoons!