You may be wondering why Fred was…NAKED…on Halloween.
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| From Halloween 2008 |
Well, that story begins back in May. When we buried a few clothes for Fred. Basing it off a tutorial over on SkullandBone.com.
Well, concerned that my fish-tank solution would not be quite as effective as their pond scum, I happened upon some sheet composting information, and figured it may just work for rotting clothes too. So, we put some more clothes to use there.
Thus began the great Rot-Off!
WHICH method would be better? Which one would Fred wear? Will my wife kill me over the piles of rotting crapola in the yard? Would anyone even notice?
We dug things up a week prior to Halloween.
The “pond scum” method came out pretty much as expected. But…a little bad luck made them useless for Fred.
Top half of a shirt that covered a bit too much of Fred’s chest.
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| From Halloween buildup '08 |
“Fun” digging up graves…
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| From Halloween buildup '08 |
Kyle finds a pair of pants…that had the entire front eaten away.
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| From Halloween buildup '08 |
And, that fancy button down white collered shirt…only the right half survived.
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| From Halloween buildup '08 |
But, the question remained…just how would the sheet composting match up???
Peeling back the newspaper we were greeted with a most UNIQUE smell…and a bunch of insect life I had never seen before.
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| From Halloween buildup '08 |
What remained of the shirt buried here…
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| From Halloween buildup '08 |
The pants only had the seems, pockets, and zipper left.
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| From Halloween buildup '08 |
But, instead of tossing a bunch of holey pants that no longer fit Alec, we tested them in the sheet compost pile, and the results show just how I can fine tune it for next year!
Alec pants placed on top of the compost pile, show no rot, as expected.
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| From Halloween buildup '08 |
Alec pants placed in the middle of the grass, not touching ground have very nice rotting.
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| From Halloween buildup '08 |
Alec Pants placed at ground level and covered once again have only the pockets and seams intact.
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| From Halloween buildup '08 |
So, just how potent is this sheet composting? Sheet composting on the left, ‘traditional’ method on the right.
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| From Halloween buildup '08 |
And, my understanding is that LEAVES make even better material than GRASS clippings for this sheet composting…so, as the leaves fall…maybe it’s time to rot some clothes.