[Zippy]

I have two compost bins which I usually just throw a piece of carpet over the tops to keep the heat in. Rainwater is able to get through to keep the heaps damp which helps to keep the heat up.

Just recently I made a wooden lid for one and covered it with a sheet of black PVC to catch rainwater which runs into a piece of guttering at the front of the compost bin and then into a bucket at the end - quite ingenious I thought.

But then I thought, hang on, what if the heap doesn't heat up because all the rain water is being diverted and I just end up with a heap of dried weeds?

I could dampen the heap with tap water of course, but then what's the point of saving rainwater then?

Oh, decisions decisions.

[Trillium]

You could always take a watercan full of rainwater and dampen the compost. It needn't be a flood to work.

[Kristen]

The only liquid my compost heap gets is what is on the material itself initially. And pee. Usually once a day Stuck a digital thermometer in the middle of the heap the other day and it was 82F