Building a Compost Bin to Transform Wood Shavings into Soil 

I absolutely love how narrator Justin puts current Justin into scenarios like sawdust cereal so casually. It's so funny to me, your brand of comedy is subtle but it always hits

Yes to compost updates please! It was so satisfying to watch those final slats go in. What a neat setup. 😊 But please do take your time. Losing a friend like Miles is hard. Glad you’re doing okay. ❤

I feel you, Justin. I lost a loved one and threw myself into my woodshop. She wanted to be cremated, so to honor her, I made a beautiful oak box for her ashes. I know she would have loved it, and it kept me away from my thoughts for a while. We all miss your furry side kick. My wife and I are sending you love and positive thoughts.

I never expected to leave a comment like this on a youtube video but yeah, I would like a compost update down the line this was really neat! And as other have said, take your time and don't rush, the healing process of losing a beloved friend like Miles isn't easy for anyone and nobody can blame you for having the difficulty in making more stuff. I may not be able to afford to be a patron but I also really appreciate them giving you that support in this time even when you can't be full throttle putting out videos.

Am I the only one strangely giddy over the fact that this sawdust recycling system, itself produced tons of sawdust? ❤

Don't feel bad about needing time after such a loss. I'd rather know you're okay than forcing yourself to work.

Take all the time you need! Grief isn't something to be rushed. Let yourself feel, let yourself heal at your own pace 💜 we'll all be here

@4:00 - this is hands down the best sponsor read of any video on youtube

I think some custom garden tools or even just custom handles for garden tools would be a fun way to work compost updates into a future video. Love all the work you do!

Hey man. For what its worth, going through your backlog kept me sane for a while when I lost my wife recently. Its hard, and it won't not hurt, but you'll learn to live around it. One mourner to another, hope the world's a little kinder on ya.

Seeing your granddad in front of his own big ol’ woodpile brings me so much joy

More backyard fun please

I love this build and the meaning it has for you! I'm sure your grandad is proud, and Mile's is smiling down, wagging his tail 🖤🤍🤎

that's such a nice looking compost bin, thank you for comedy and for the honesty for how you're grieving for miles

I will LIVE for compost updates

Sustainability is always cool as hell

At 09:42 did you break the tape measure? I've never seen that before!

You are lucky to have never gone shopping for wood with my late father. He once tied lumber to the roof of a two door Toyota sedan from the 1970s. Please remember that I was pulling on the ropes holding it in place and I was 14.

this was a joy to watch, from my downtown studio apartment with not so much as a window box. great project, well done, and very glad it’s kept your mind and hands occupied, while also honouring your lost loved ones in such sweet ways. good luck with the microorgs, and do take care ❤

my dad and papa started a garden together! recently my dad made a compost bin and it really changed the game, everything is growing so well and they both are so proud of it, it’s so sweet to see 🥹 my papa’s mom had a garden when he was younger so it’s nice to see him reliving his childhood, you can see how excited he is when he shows us what’s been planted and growing

You ever consider using the shavings and dust to grow edible mushrooms from spawn?

Always enjoy seeing people composting. I have a cold compost even if it’s slower it works for me. Been making compost for about a year now and it’s so much fun, just watching stuff break down. Even found some earthworms in a pot and I threw them in to help break stuff down

Saw well put together! I'll see my self out...

we love you justin! your content is so comfy and i love watching your videos while i work. the composter is super cool!

Wonderful video. I compost and my friends say I have magic dirt. I also have the advantage of knowing someone with a worm farm. I've always seen the triple co.post bin, but never realized you shift them like that. ❤

I didn't notice you hit 1m congrats you really deserve it, your videos are so comforting and funny and honestly a breath of fresh air compared to how overly produced youtube now feels its nice to watch someone just share their hobby and what they enjoy and teaching others what they love. It's really nice and I love watching you stuff when I feel down

So sorry to hear about Miles. Lost our dog a few months ago. My wife prodded me to get a pup and she was right. Im so glad we did. I hope you find whatever you need to help yourself heal. 🌲 ❤️ 😊

Not only a compost update but garden updates in general would be awesome! Would love to see the fruits and veggies you've got scattered around!

Definitely will need compost updates ❤ Be easy on yourself, grieving really takes it out of you. Us saplings can wait 🌱💚

I really love the genuine and down-to-earth feel of tour content. It's a refreshing change to what become the standard fast moving, flashy videos

I can already tell that this is gonna be my favorite justinthetrees video

2:59 idk why but watching the tape measure slowly crawl towards you while you mark the wood cracks me up

Please give us updates. Happy to be able to watch your videos. Sorry for your loss of Miles.

RIP Milo

Oh man, you might get hate for that table saw footage at the start of the video. Awesome video.

Love to see some home-based tree content, good soil, good trees, because although forests are awesome, our urban forests and gardens deserve attention too!

Looks great! I'll just add one small correction. Your C:N ratio should be 30 to 1. Too much nitrogen will make it smell bad and the nitrogen will leach out quickly and pollute your watershed.

11:02 great to see the Grandpa with the Grandpile! Seriously Justin, my grandpa was the one who got me into woodworking and he’s the one I always think of whenever I do it, so this really moved me❤ HAPPY COMPOSTING!!!🌳

I have a bag full of shavings from carving, its a shame I dont have a place to compost them

The clip of your grandpa was awesome. I’m so glad you included it!

As a lover of gardening, I really appreciate this video. I loved this content. I am so sorry for the loss of your best bud. Been there , done that. It makes it very hard to look at a picture of them let alone a video. Keep up the great videos. I love them all.

You should do a wild flower series. I think it would be helpful to know what flowers are native to different regions and what species benefit from those flowers in their habitat.

i do this all the time, i mix my wood shavings with chicken poop and compost, I also make fires tarterts with them, or in chicken coops

Composting is my favorite thing to do in the garden, it's what I do best. I'd love to see more of yours. 💚

We lost our dog two months ago, also to internal bleeding from a tumor. I can relate to the difficult feeling going to places that are filled with memories, and it sucks. I find it awesome that you are both able to talk about it, and also to keep making videos in your unique style and humor. Keep up the great work!

Absolutely 💯 yes to compost updates, please!

I love the video, and the John Rae tribute was the best!

I'm so sorry for your loss, and I appreciate your willingness to be vulnerable in sharing your grief. It's so hard, but it also gives people an opportunity to show you caring and support as well as the fact that it is okay to be vulnerable and share your feelings. You've done a nice job balancing that in this video. Kudos for joining the compsting club! A tip before your compost bin gets too full: compost piles are very attractive to critters, many of whom you do not want to feel comfy too close to your house, but you can make it harder for them to set up shop in your bin. - Flip the current contents into a wheelbarrow or onto a tarp, then turn the frame over to staple hardware cloth to the bottom of the frame, as you did along the back. - You can make super-simple lids by stapling hardware cloth to frames just like the ones you made for the sides, or get a little fancy and use some hinges so you don't have to haul the lid all the way off to add to the bin. The lids I bought from the county with my bins are 2 half-size frames, with hinges between them as well as attaching one frame to the bin frame. This offers a smaller opening that just needs to be flipped atop its sibling, so the whole lid doesn't need to be lifted and propped for regular use. -- I would add a cross-brace to the lids so they aren't too wobbledy. -- I learned the hard way that hardware cloth that is only stapled to the bottom of a frame will pull out of staples if something falls on it (perhaps a child who had already been told not to climb on the compost bins). It's painful to get scratched by loose hardware cloth. My quick fix was to add wide-headed nails that would hold more than a single line of the grid in from the edge of the cloth. When I have time and materials, I cut to size, then screw 1/4" x 1-1/8" slats to cover the edges of the hardware cloth on at least the front edge. This comment got away from me. Thanks if you read the whole thing!

Great video

I have been composting my wood waste too, it works fast here in Mississippi. Prayers for you and your family.

2 months in! Let's see what's going on with the compost soon! Really loved the video because I've always loved the idea of composting.

They also make great tinder for fires and with a blender and tub and some screens they make beautiful paper for prints or drawings or window shades!

When I bought my house I started a pile of leaves on the back of my property, it’s been just shy of 4 years and all of my grass clippings and leaves get thrown on top, occasionally we will put food waste, sawdust, hay, and rabbit droppings onto the top. Just last week I was able to use around 1 cubic yard of quality composted soil in my yard, with as little effort I had put in I was very surprised with the outcome. Composting is a great way to keep yard waste down!

i had a wonderful time watching you go through this process, much love to you and your loved ones as you celebrate the life of miles

Loved this video!! Great use of the wood shavings!! And YES please update when that sweet sweet compost is ready for the garden!!! 🤩

I think compost updates would be super fun

I just built some compost bins last year. Went with the pallet option for free. Came back later and adding hardware cloth to it. Works pretty well. And if you want to skip the hardware cloth expense, you can line the walls with cardboard.

I like this project, topic, and format. Thank you!

Sorry for your heartbreak for Miles - love joining in the walking through the grief with you - love Grampa - Peace and Grace to you and yours

Great use for it, my dad makes firestarters for the fireplace and pit

I'd love updates, I didn't realize how much work goes into composting

I’ve learned more from this one video (not to mention your channel as a whole) than I ever had in any school class

I'd definitely love to see updates! I'm still an apartment-dweller so any stinky yard projects are still beyond my capabilities, but I definitely want to do composting eventually and am always happy to learn more about it over time. My sister is doing a lot of gardening and they have a large yard, now I'm tempted to see if I can help them start a composting..

I know that personal stories of "hey, I've been through that, too." Don't help everyone, but... I really do hope that this may help you, a bit. I lost my cat, about... 3 years ago, now? Going into 4 at the end of this year, and my dog... 2 years ago? Watching your videos helped me keep my mind off things, and I haven't cried in a while... But it was really hard, losing them within a year of eachother like that. Messed me up for like two years, and I was already struggling even before that. Your videos are very fun, informative, and you have a very similar interest as I do, with trees and plants and uses for them-- so you really helped. And, I know this is always said, but... It does improve, over time. I know I miss my Cat, and Dog-- and I know that a lot your community is mourning Miles with you. Don't rush or pressure yourself, Justin-- we all love you, and know that Miles is extremely important to you! 💜

I’m so sorry about Miles! That’s so hard Please give us a compost update! I want to see that beautiful new dirt

As always a great project (though I'm saddened by the lack of compost bin chatoyancy). And, as so many others in the comments here are saying, please take your time to grieve. Losing a family member, human or otherwise, is an incredibly difficult thing to go through, and taking care of yourself is so much more important than producing a few youtube videos. It's great to see you work on things that feel good for you to do, and I'm looking forward to whatever comes next, but don't rush. We'll be here.

I’m so sorry for your loss. It’s devastating losing a companion animal.

Seeing this video found me at the perfect time, personally

I also lost my best friend in a house fire a couple weeks ago, I still miss him so much

My garden beds are all wood shavings based. Great stuff

🌲

Hey this is a nice build, but I just want give you a heads up... That tree is going to send tiny roots into your compost pile once it decomposes far enough. By the time you harvest finished compost, you're gonna be ripping up tiny, vein-like roots out of your black gold. I've had this happen and realized that I needed to move my composter outside of the trees range. Usually the root system underground is equal to the canopy coverage above in spread (roughly).

I loved the unexpected grandpa content. More more more!! ❤️

Sorry for your loss ❤ 🙏🏼

Compost chatoincey 😂😂 nice one m8 sorry to here about miles he was a beauty 😢 ive been through heartache with mine recently lost 1 about 3 months ago and still haven't processed it properly. Stay strong 💪 oh and this build awesome may have to try smaller version of this 🤔🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿👍

I'm so sorry to hear about Miles, that really sucks. I also am really happy to see this project! I've been looking at getting into composting at my new place and this gets the gears a-turnin'.

So so sorry for your loss.

Looks great 👍

Im sorry for your loss.

9:46 😂😂 you nonchalantly mentioned measuring the opening that I did a double take 😂😂 I absolutely love your humour. I absolutely love your videos. My sincere condolences mate.

Would definitely love updates!!

I've been throwing my lathe shavings and other sawdust on my cold compost pile for about a year now. It did a great job keeping the weeds down while it was fresh, and the bottom layers have broken down really nicely already. Would love to see progress updates!

I never saw this coming 😉

This is great! Great application.🎉🎉🎉 Hang in there.❤

You inspired me to make pinecone syrup, and I've gone a bit nuts with it. I currently have nine species fermenting, and holy smokes the Douglas fir tastes like blueberries!

Love this- definitely want updates! I’m glad this project has been helping you ❤

We loved the video, thank you! We love all your videos, but this one was especially awesome as it was informative and fun. We'd definitely love to see updates on this project. My kids and I are also sorry for the loss of Miles, it's always hard to lose a furry friend. 😢

Excellent video. Sorry for your loss. Keep the content coming

this was a lovely watch, really liked the different kind of video! would love to see updates on the compost!

Awesome video! I was both educated and entertained😄 I also use my lathe shavings as mulch in the garden beds

I think I saw your problem with the cereal... those shavings were linguini noodle size! Should've made a tomato sauce or Alfredo sauce. Happy to help!

Yes!! Updates please! 🙂👍🏾

I've been wanting to make something very similar for awhile. It looks very nice.

I see a potato box in your future

Internally screaming at the 36x35 in "square" 😂

Love the dirt making, please keep it up ❤

The way I see it - this video fits right into the rest of your content! You're making things out of wood and trees in creative ways! I'm so sorry you lost miles, and I think it's really good that you're sharing how you feel about it - not only is it good for you to share and be seen - but It's really important that we have more of this content circling around! People cry, men cry, emotions are valid, losing a dog is one of the worst things that can happen to a person and it's legitimate to be broken to bits over it (I have a friend who didn't feel like it was ok to mourn his cat that died unexpectedly), after a tragedy life goes on - you cherish the memories and you look forward to keep on living a good life filled with making others (humans and non-humans) happy.

Hopefully you feel better emotionally i feel you,take as much time as you need to recover from this

Sorry about Miles, man. Happy to see your videos coming back up.

we love you ❤️ hang in there