The humanure handbook
"This is a cult classic"—The New Yorker An updated edition of an underground classic This is the 4th edition of a self-published book that no respectable publisher would touch with a ten-foot shovel. The 1st edition was published in 1994 with a print run of 600 copies, which the author expected to watch decompose in his garage for the rest of his life. Now, 24 years later, the book has sold over 65,000 print copies in the U.S. alone, been translated in whole or in part into 19 languages and been published in foreign editions on four continents. The previous editions won numerous awards, including the Independent Publisher Outstanding Book of the Year Award, deeming the book "Most Likely to Save the Planet.” The book has been mentioned on such diverse media outlets as: Mother Earth News, Whole Earth Review, Countryside Journal, The Journal of Environmental Quality, Natural Health, NPR, BBC, CBC, Howard Stern, The Wall Street Journal, Playboy Magazine, Organic Gardening Magazine, the History Channel, Tree House Masters, and many other national and international venues. The 4th edition is a completely revised, expanded, and updated version of what has become an underground classic bestseller. The author draws from 40 years of research, experience, and travel, to expand and clarify your knowledge and understanding of... your poop!
Stats for nerds
6recommend
10mentions
10people
2014–2025years
60% recommend40% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- The system I have experience with and the one that's recommended in Jenkins "Humanure Handbook" is a simple bucket.
Spray sawdust on top after use and close the lid. Dump the bucket in compost bin when full, which should happen every 1-2 days in a household with a few people.
Barely any smells, no insect problems, cost is very low.
- Excellent book on the topic of "humanure": https://www.amazon.com/Humanure-Handbook-4th-Shit-Nutshell/d...
- I recommend The Humanure Handbook by Joseph Jenkins. The definitive guide to humanure composting, and the best reference for general composting I've read.
- Fertilizers in general aren't necessarily bad. It is important for us to actively recycle our phosphorous and potassium, because there is no short term replenishment of these vital elements in the soil. For more information, I highly recommend "The Humanure Handbook": http://humanurehandbook.com/downloads/Humanure_Handbook_all....
Fertilizers do increase the growth rate of plants. However, there is mounting evidence that nutritional content is inversely proportional with growth rate.
- The Humanure Handbook (http://humanurehandbook.com/) goes into the specifics of how to build sawdust toilets and manage waste and compost safely. For those even remotely interested, the e-book is only USD$10, and earlier editions are free for the downloading.
If you know someone who lives in the country and is interested in off-the-grid living, or is merely serious about gardening, a copy would make for an unusual gift.
- We used compost (sawdust) toilets in our house for a few months before we had indoor plumbing. Before I read "The Humanure Handbook" I thought the very idea was some kind of awful hippie bullshit. However now I have realized something that is really obvious when you try it:
Some machines and designs have been perfected for centuries. The toilet however is not one of them! Because it took us so long to discover how germs make us sick, our toilets were really horrible things.
In fact, it has taken us so long to understand sanitation, composting, and the environmental impact of using fresh-water flushing toilets, that the entire human race has become used to an activity (flushing toilets) that is astoundingly wasteful (you're not only wasting drinking water, but you're wasting excellent nutrients in your own shit which is then lost to sewage sludge, which itself takes huge resources to purify)
The thing is, you can totally recycle all human (and food) waste without much of an inconvenience and really no smell at all. Yes, let me repeat that - no smell at all. You crap in a bucket of sawdust, cover it completely with more sawdust, and the bucket does not smell.
The fact that our civilization has taught itself that flushing our shit away with drinking water is "the right thing to do" is really very troubling and wrong once you realize the vast resources that could be saved by some very, very basic stuff like sawdust toilets and composting.
I am aware that achieving this on an urban scale would be a challenge, but it can certainly be solved.....
