My recent adventure involving a clogged low-flow toilet makes me miss the days of the bucket.
We used the Humanure system for over 5 years, and it worked great for us. Sure, there were bitter cold January days when I heard “Papa, the toilet’s full. Will you empty it?”, when I wished we could just flush, but overall, I’m quite fond of the bucket.
Here’s why:
The Allure of Humanure: Ten Reasons to Love a Sawdust Toilet
- A sawdust toilet never gets clogged.
- When it needs cleaning, you just take it outside and spray it out.
- It uses no water, except for cleaning.
- Composting returns nutrients to the soil.
- There’s no splash.
- It’s great for camping. Leave no trace.
- You’ll never have a plumbing leak.
- It doesn’t smell like an outhouse. It smells like the woods.
- They make for great conversation. “Derek, what do you collect?” “Well, funny you should ask…”
- They never get clogged. Ever.
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{ 11 comments… read them below or add one }
Hmmmm. Never heard of this. I might have to Google it!
Okay, seriously–is this like a sawdust “litterbox” for people?
Kind of… except you don’t have to scratch in the dirt afterwards…
They make great camping toilets, and they don’t smell (well, they don’t smell worse than any other toilet).
What about toilet paper? Where do you put the toilet paper? And what happens when you need to urinate?
No thanks, regular toilet for me.
Toilet paper goes right in the bucket to be composted as well. Urine can go in the bucket, but we also used a ‘pee bucket’ so the main one wouldn’t fill up right away with liquid.
The humanure toilet is a great choice if you don’t have a regular toilet, or if the water is off due to some kind of infrastructure problem. If all you have is a flush toilet, but the water or electricity is out (to the town pumps), you can’t flush anything. A bucket will work no matter what.
My grandmother had one of these when I was a little kid. Hated it. It used to smell and it was a bit away from the house so I didn’t like going there in the dark. There certainly wasn’t any reading of a good book in that toilet. In and out real quick.
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That sounds like an outhouse – the humanure system isn’t any smellier than a regular bathroom.
The way I have my Sawdust Toilet set up is:
I have The well made wooden box and wooded toilet seat
(the nicer that looks the better) next to that I have a well stocked
supply of sawdust and organic mix’ins (it is fun to stalk out cool stuff)
Now what I have done which i feel is a step above the whole process
discribed here, is I have added another toilet seat that is over a washing basin (those over sized sinks you see in washing machine rooms) I have this washing basin boxed up like my 5 gallon sawdust
bucket is (to look real nice) and I have suppled a warm water bidet hose…this way I keep a roll of T Paper hanging for anyone that wants
it…but it is totally not needed…everything (pee & washing up water)
goes down a drain to a simply dry well that is out of site…
the whole system is “out of sight” if you ask me!
Wow! That is a very cool set-up. I definitely have to integrate that into our next building. Thanks! (Any pictures?)
Derek,
A 6 gal. plastic bucket with toilet seat and urine diverter works great. Sawdust toilets only smell bad when feces and urine are allowed to mix. A urine diverter directs urine to a separate 1 gallon jug that has to be emptied every other day (2 people). This can be poured around the base of trees and basically breaks down into ammonia nitrate (liquid gold fertilizer). As for the “sawdust” I prefer to buy a big bag of potting soil………..take a poop and then cover with about 3 scoops of potting soil……….no smell, no smell, no smell. It dries it out…………….it is pretty arid here in New Mexico so that helps. With two people………this toilet needs to be emptied about 2 times per week. Where……right into the compost pile………….then beautiful compost for the garden………………but only ever applied to fruit trees, raspberry bushes etc………I would never apply to crops like leafy greens, etc. I don’t want to risk e.coli infections. Again…….the trick to all this is never mix urine with feces and when you do poo…………cover it up thoroughly with dirt so the stool begins to desiccate (dry out). I can’t believe how there really is no smell. And gosh why spend $800 to $1400 on a composting toiler when you can make your own for less than $150
Tim
After being introduced to the amusing and informative book “The Humanure Handbook” our family has used sawdust toilets on and off for several years. We recycle houses as a family income project. We use the sawdust toilets at the work site. Also while camping. My husband and sons built a “green room” (outhouse) with recycled materials from other projects which had an anderson window with a beautiful view of the woods (had a blind also) and a hardwood floor, a shelf with reading material, a bucket with sawdust and of course the sawdust toilet. Never had an odor problem, or insects either. We set up the sawdust toilet inside the house in the wintertime for an extra option, ( we have a large family and only one flusher). We composted it all and year three started using the compost in the gardens. Wow! It was even better than goat manure or chicken manure, plus it didn’t smell bad. We didn’t turn the compost pile, only adding green clippings and old hay on top after we dumped a bucket on.