Storage shed solution
We put together a storage
shed this afternoon.
It's one of those plastic
resin Rubermaid kits.
Total cost was around 360
dollars. Anna worked 3 hours and I came along at the end and helped for
an hour. It comes with a nice 37 page instruction book and it all fit
in a box the size of a coffin.
We talked about maybe
building something out of wood, but our recent high
grade chicken feed
purchase put us in a spot where we needed storage fast, and this was
the quick and easy route.
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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.
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Did you put in a solid floor, and are there no gaps between the walls and the floors? I'm guessing all that food will attract mice, rats and other critters like crazy. Especially mice seem to be able to get through really small holes.
I once lived in a building that had both mice and ants, so I developed the habit of putting all foodstuffs that were not in the fridge in closed metal, glass or plastic containers. That works very well w.r.t. spoilage, and keeps stuff fresh as well.
Maybe it would be a good idea to move the contents of at least opened bags to a big pail with a tight lid.
But I wonder why one would need 37 pages of instructions to put that together?! Unless it's one page in 37 languages.
Roland --- Yeah, we're a bit concerned about that possibility. Our friends have tried various solutions to the rodent problem, and ended up just putting traps in with their feed and emptying the dead rodents out regularly. We'll keep an eye on the situation and report back if we have to raise the stakes.
The 37 page instruction manual was a bit overkill, but it was actually kinda nice. Half a page of nicely drawn illustrations for each step. I didn't get confused at all....
Those woods in the background with all the spring greenery and light filtering through make for a beautiful image. Congrats on the new shed!
~ Mitsy
While I could imagine a rodent gnawing its way through a plastic pail, no rodent is going to gnaw through galvanized steel! But a tight-fitting lid is important against ants and to not attract unwanted attention. And using bungee cord to keep the lid shut is a trick to remember!
A strip of self-adhesive rubber foam around the inside of the lid would probably work well to seal a loose fitting lid, though.
Roland --- We've actually had pretty good luck with our non-bungee-corded on lids. We might see an ant or two, but they don't see to be a real issue with chicken feed. I suspect the grains are just too dry?
On the other hand, that's right in our yard where bigger critters aren't going to come by and try to get in. I'm sure a raccoon would make short work of our garbage can. (That reminds me --- we probably should get a lock for our storage building to keep out the coons!)