I forgot to mention that I had two other containers that are twenty gallon plastic containers that I had filled with top soil dirt and set them on 2x4s under each container. I had squash in them also that turned into a disaster. While I was emptying them I got them empty and I picked them up to take and wash out. I picked up one of the 2x4s that were under the tub and a snake came scooting out about six inches long. It looked like a baby black racer. Scared the living hell out of me. That was Wednesday of last week.

A couple days after that I was sitting in the back room with a rear door overlooking the back yard having a chew of tobacco. I looked out and I seen a slender shadow moving about ten feet from the door. Opened the door and a snake about three or four feet long stopped and looked up at me. I moved outside the door and advanced toward the snake and it took off to the edge of the yard and disappeared. Looked like a black racer. Seen that snake quite awhile ago in the yard and looked up snakes in SC to identify it as a black racer as it travels likety split fast. Never seen a snake travel that fast before.

Must be the snake has made itself a home in the back yard under the deck or under the AC unit.

May reuse those containers as they are a nice size. Will save me the trouble of building two boxes. May use one for the parsnips filling it up with potting mix using the same procedure I used to to refill the wooden boxes. The other container I was thinking of using as a mulch bin. May decide to get one of those small bales of wheat straw at the garden center. Bust open the bale and shake some of it out on the ground and then take my mulcher mower and shred it up into tinier pieces. Put that in the plastic container as a starter for the compost added as time goes along. The container has a nice cover which I will drill holes in about one inch in diameter to let rain in.

I do not want to use grass clippings or leaves from the yard in the mulch bin as the yard has had nasty chemicals added over the years for bug control. The grass and leaves could take in this nasty crap which would contaminate the containers if I added it as compost to the containers.