Songaia Cohousing Community
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Recycling at Songaia

Chuck Hanna-Myrick

  
Chuck digs into a worm box
(he forgot to smile, but is friendly) 
We currently have 4 worm boxes, so most of our vegetable waste goes to feeding the worms or directly into our compost piles.

Many of our well-read newspapers are torn up, providing bedding material for our worms when we start using a ‘fresh’ section of the worm bins.

When the worms are done with it, this newly created soil is sifted out, and left to age a while. Then we take it to our greenhouse and mix it with garden soil, and a variety of other ingredients to make both potting soil and to augment Songaia's organic gardens. 

Fred (on tractor) moving the manure pile.
Bill (standing) helping to clear brush.

Years ago, many horses were boarded on the property, so that well decomposed cleanings/droppings are also used to enrich the soils for gardening.

We also take waste wood to a local top soil recycler where it is chipped & mixed with soil.

Metal, such as parts of old vehicles, old steel fence posts, etc. are taken to a nearby metal recycler (we've almost finished completely cleaning up our property of such "junk"). This is one of our few recycling activities that actually results in some income.

We also affect the other end of the consumption chain... for building projects, we buy recycled materials from a local ‘Second Use’ business. ‘Second Use’ collects usable materials from buildings that are being upgraded, or torn down.

Not only is use of recycled materials better for the earth, but they cost less too!

We also recycle paint, taking left over paint to a paint recycling center, and have receiving mixed paint in return. We were planning on painting our utility building several years ago, and lo and behold, the paint we received is very close to the color we chose several years ago!


2nd Use is a well-used building

materials recycler...

As we move forward, we will continue to evolve our recycling efforts.
Songaia Cohousing Community Home Updated: July 22, 2005