Overwhelmed by the leaning tower...

The leaning tower of pallets! I have been considering a plethora of options for Harvest Gardens' compost system over the past month or two. A few weeks ago Carla provided me with some great links about compost construction. It turns out she is quite the community gardener being a member of the University of Calgary community garden as well. I encourage everyone to check out their Urban Gardener blog and the web site that hosts their very creative how to video "How We Built Our Community Garden's Compost Bin".

I really liked the idea of reusing pallets. And having heard some other positive comments from people that had re-purposed pallets I was raring to go. I knew that there were a few hanging around my office and after checking around I found out that the company I work for would be overjoyed if we found another purpose for their slightly worn pallets. So I decided last week that on the following Monday I would take my lunch and pull some pallets apart salvaging some wood for our compost project. The pictures below are what I  found as I walked in with a little claw hammer that I borrowed from the receptionist (it was included in an Ikea picture hanging kit, apparently the hammer couldn't even handle tapping tacks into drywall either).

Needless to say I will be bringing some other tools and scheduling some extra time for this one. I couldn't even reach the top of the stacks to pull a pallet down to try and work on it. But there is definitely some great wood to be had.

Anyway I have reset my fear-o-meter and will strive to tackle this one on Wednesday. There will definitely be pictures for proof, and more than likely a splinter or two.