trash can root cellar

[JRinPA]

Does anyone here use a trash can root cellar?
Would it work here in SE PA?
What time of year can you start using it?
Ground is considered 55F so right now it would still be substantially warmer than that. Can onions pulled in July or August store in that?

example info: https://www.treehugger.com/build-a-root-cellar-3016868

The Trash Can Root Cellar

A simple, inexpensive way to store small quantities of vegetables is to use a trash can as a root cellar. You will need to dig a hole deep enough to fit nearly the entire trash can. Buy a galvanized steel trash can and drill holes into the bottom of it (to allow moisture from the surrounding soil into the can). Put the can into the hole, with about three to four inches of it sticking up above the surface of the ground. Plop in the vegetables and secure the lid (you might need to bungee it closed if you have raccoons). Top with a 12-inch layer of straw or leaves and a tarp.

[Cole_Robbie]

If you drilled holes in it, then it would just fill with water. The hardest part of burying a container is digging a drain for it. Otherwise rainwater will just float it out of the hole.

[MissS]

I don't know if that would work where I live. When I had my Koi pond it had to be 3 feet deep to avoid the fish from freezing and dying. I know from experience ice fishing that the water here freezes a good 2 - 2.5 feet thick. I would think that you need your veggies below your frost line. So if you look that up then you know if this would work or not and how deep you need to go.

[worth1]

I'm not getting the holes in the bottom.
I was raised around real root cellars that did double duty as storm cellars plus homemade beer and wine storage.
Almost everyone had one.

[JRinPA]

I looked this stuff up a year or two back; even then, it didn't make a "hole" lot of sense.

I have a theory that people that like to make websites, make websites. People that like to make videos and be seen, make videos. And that info on the subjects they are discussing is secondary to the process. Is this such a case? Probably the person that wrote this never actually made one, has no idea if it would work, and probably copied and paraphrased the idea from someone else? Yet met their goal of getting high up in the search engine returns?

[rxkeith]

we knew a guy in detroit that stored i think potatoes in a trash can he had buried near his house.
this guy was a very unique individual. he was a garbage man on disability, but he was a very knowledgeable
gardener, and a wine expert to boot. we had some good meals at his house, but he lived in a BAD part of town.
we heard a gun fight break out next door one night. he always had a shot gun ready to go at one end of his bed.

someone we knew here in da U.P. had dug a large hole in his back yard. in the hole he had a wooden box maybe 4ft by 3 ft
that he had water proofed on the outside. it looked black with some oily pitch. the box had a lid. inside the box, he would store
his carrots, and rutabagas. they would keep all winter. up here there is some work required in keeping the snow cleared.
thats another idea to consider. just make sure before you start digging, that you know there isn't anything down there that
would not be good for a shovel to hit it.



keith

[bower]

I'm not getting the use of galvanized metal under the ground. It will rust eventually, especially if you drill holes in it, but it also has no insulative value, and as a heat conductor will pretty well ensure you have maximum temperature variation where you want to aim for the minimum.
That wooden box sounds like a better bet to me.
A deep cellar can have problems with flooding if the drainage isn't great. My Dad had a poorly drained cellar at one time. In spring there was sometimes a foot of water down there. Eventually they had to put in a french drain to take water away from the area. That would be a big expense for the value of a mini cellar. So if your water table runs high, you might consider building a mounded cellar above ground. Just start with your wooden box only a little below grade. Pile rocks over it if you have any, then mound earth over the top, leaving an openable door on the sheltered side. If the point is winter storage, I mean, I think you would face the opening south, away from prevailing winds. Not an expert comment, just thinking it through.
Cellars built into the side of a little hill are fantastic. Works as well as underground, but the access is so much better.
I will add that there's no reason not to use present day insulative materials to improve cellar performance. Slab insulation on the inside walls and door, for example, will increase the chance of perfect storage.

[worth1]

On the Beverly Hillbillies Jethro dug granny a root cellar and struck oil.
If memory serves me he hit an oil pipeline.
Like there would be one in Beverly hills.

But anyway I looked on YouTube and there's a million trash can root cellar videos.

Most All the root cellars I've seen were the mound type and I never saw water in one.
Maybe it was because they put a French drain in.
Many were probably a hundred years old.

I do know one thing when digging holes for fruit trees in Missouri and Oklahoma the holes would fill up with water really fast.
This was in the winter or early spring.
But both places had natural springs on them.

[JRinPA]

I can't see how it would work at anytime before November. I've read through quite a few descriptions, and the ones with bottom holes sometimes say for drainage, other times for ventilation...most do not have bottom holes but warn against a high water table. I do like the idea I saw with some, to drop the can through a shed floor. I don't see how I could do that, but cool idea nonetheless.

I just can't figure how a little trash can would work here except in the winter when it already cold. It can't possibly get cooler than 55 except Nov to April. Is that the only time frame they are good for? By that time I can use the basement for some things.

I think a coolbot type would be the way to go for me, here. Like now, killed a deer 7-8 hours ago. Skinned and cut up some but I need to sleep. First, though, eating some poppers and checking the internet.

So I'm leaving it out overnight and getting up at first light to finish - I really didn't want to pull the loins before it cools down because they shrink and toughen up. But if I had a walk in coolbot cooler, I could have done it a lot different, or the same and just moved it inside there and not worry about it. I could keep a lot of vegetables in there, and a place to age meat. I'm just not sure about the electric bill, as crazy as the rates have gotten. Mid September, and the basement is still 70F. With an old 5000 btu AC hooked into a styrofoam room, keeping it at 36-38F, how much power is that using? Would it use more or less if the AC exhausts indoors to the basement, or through a window to outdoors?

[rossomendblot]

I looked this stuff up a year or two back; even then, it didn't make a "hole" lot of sense.

I have a theory that people that like to make websites, make websites. People that like to make videos and be seen, make videos. And that info on the subjects they are discussing is secondary to the process. Is this such a case? Probably the person that wrote this never actually made one, has no idea if it would work, and probably copied and paraphrased the idea from someone else? Yet met their goal of getting high up in the search engine returns?

From their About Us section - "The site was acquired by Discovery Communications in 2007, and in 2012 Mother Nature Network (part of the Narrative Content Group) took over. In 2020, both Mother Nature Network and Treehugger were acquired by Dotdash Meredith, where they are now one big happy family."

Most of the websites you see popping up search results over and over are owned by 16 companies. Dotdash Meredith is the 3rd biggest of those, and its websites get over 600 million clicks a month through Google.

To be fair to the author, she does seem to own a small homestead/farm so might well have tried this kind of root cellar. It would be nice if the article went in to more detail and showed the root cellar in use. There's quite a few other websites describing the same thing and some videos on Youtube of people trying them out.

[Cole_Robbie]

I can't see how it would work at anytime before November. I've read through quite a few descriptions, and the ones with bottom holes sometimes say for drainage, other times for ventilation...most do not have bottom holes but warn against a high water table. I do like the idea I saw with some, to drop the can through a shed floor. I don't see how I could do that, but cool idea nonetheless.

I just can't figure how a little trash can would work here except in the winter when it already cold. It can't possibly get cooler than 55 except Nov to April. Is that the only time frame they are good for? By that time I can use the basement for some things.

I think a coolbot type would be the way to go for me, here. Like now, killed a deer 7-8 hours ago. Skinned and cut up some but I need to sleep. First, though, eating some poppers and checking the internet.

So I'm leaving it out overnight and getting up at first light to finish - I really didn't want to pull the loins before it cools down because they shrink and toughen up. But if I had a walk in coolbot cooler, I could have done it a lot different, or the same and just moved it inside there and not worry about it. I could keep a lot of vegetables in there, and a place to age meat. I'm just not sure about the electric bill, as crazy as the rates have gotten. Mid September, and the basement is still 70F. With an old 5000 btu AC hooked into a styrofoam room, keeping it at 36-38F, how much power is that using? Would it use more or less if the AC exhausts indoors to the basement, or through a window to outdoors?

You would want the back of the window unit to be outside, as they put off a lot of heat. As for coolbots, they are popular, but it is really just a thermostat hack for a window ac. The room needs to be very insulated. They tend to still wear out air conditioners quickly.

[JRinPA]

It is getting screwy, I think it is time to reboot the internet. French Revolution style.

I say coolbot but really I figured just do two or three temp controllers, the actual coolbots are astronomical in price nowadays. Seems I recall a video I watched last year called for three controllers and a light, so like 60-75 bucks at that time. I have AC lined up, and old ACs are one thing that can be salvaged for free off CL. I want to do it but, lot of work for this house. The place that I figure would be best for it, with a high window that is just above grade outside, is all the way across the basement from the cellar door and would be real pain navigate stuff that far.

What I don't have is the actual building supplies and a firm estimate on how much it would cost to run. So many other things to do around here. I did get 3 hrs of sleep and got everything into the fridge before the sun was very high. But just about fell asleep in my climber this evening, even with that wind.

All the onions that went bad since pulling them in July just make me sad, though. If I had them at a nice cool temp, they would have lasted longer, how much longer though is tough to say. Even the stuttgarter took significant losses so far.