Q: I loved the picture I saw of your compost bin. We have three, and I'd like to get down to one that looks half decent. Did you build yours yourself or did you buy it? I saw one like it in Gardeners Supply for $90, but if we could build it ourselves, I bet we could save some money.

A: I'm not particularly handy when it comes to wood-working, but I did manage to build my slatted compost bin all by myself. It's been standing for at least 10 years and has survived wind, rain, snow and ice.

I used recycled wood from my previous vegetable garden. I had a split-rail fence around it and used 1-by-6-inch lumber for my raised beds. This was pressure-treated wood, which not everybody is still comfortable using even though the arsenic compounds have been phased out.

Two good alternatives -- if you want to avoid treated wood -- are 1.) naturally rot-resistant woods such as cedar or redwood and 2.) recycled plastic timbers.

Size is important. Compost cooks best in piles that are at least 4 feet tall, wide and deep. I made mine a side-by-side, double-bin system that's 6 feet wide, 4 feet deep and 4 feet tall with a divider in the middle.

I first sunk posts (4-by-4 size) in each of the four corners and in the front and back of the middle for the divider. Then I fastened the 1-by-6's around both sides and across the back, letting about 2 inches of space between for air flow.

At the front, I used wood strips to create slots so I could slide the front boards in and out as I empty the bins. To create the open spaces there, I used little 2-inch wooden dividers. In other words, I drop the first board down into the slots, then put dividers on top of either end, then drop the next board down on top of the dividers... and so on until all the boards are in place and the bin looks like a slatted double bin the whole way around.

The last thing I added was some wooden lattice so I can grow vines up the sides and disguise the bin altogether.

That's it. I just start stacking materials from there as stuff becomes available. Each fall, I empty the bins and use the finished compost, removing one slat at a time as I go.

Some people wire together wood skids for a similar look. Mine looks a little nicer and is more permanent. But unless you can round up some scrap or recycled wood, you'll have to buy the wood or plastic timbers, plus the nails to hammer it all together.