Gardeners at one National Trust property are urging the country to join them in peeing outdoors to help UK gardens grow greener. A three metre long ‘pee bale’ has been installed within the walled gardens of the National Trust’s Wimpole Hall in Cambridgeshire.Head Gardener, Philip Whaites, is encouraging his male colleagues to relieve themselves onto the straw bale when the call of nature occurs.

This helps activate the composting process on the estate’s compost heap – producing a free supply of compost material – and also cuts down on the estate’s water use.’For eight weeks now, male members of our garden and estate teams have been using the outdoor straw bale when nature calls, which all goes towards our eco-friendly composting system here at Wimpole,’ Philip explained.

‘The pee bale is excellent matter to add to our compost heap to stimulate the composting process; and with over 400 acres of gardens and parkland to utilise compost, we need all the help we can get.

Of course we’re very careful to make sure the pee bale is only in use out of visitor hours, as we don’t want to scare the public. And it doesn’t smell.

There are obvious logistical benefits to limiting it to male members of the team, but also male pee is preferable to women’s, as the male stuff is apparently less acidic.’

By the end of the year, it’s calculated that the ten men from the seventy strong garden and estates team will make over 1,000 individual trips to the pee bale, contributing towards the compost for the estate.

What’s more, the estate will have saved up to 30 per cent of its daily water use by not having to flush the loo so many times.

Rosemary Hooper, Wimpole estate’s in-house Master Composter, provides composting advice to visitors to help them compost whatever the size of their garden or outdoor space.

Pee on your own compost heap

Rosemary said: ‘Most people can compost in some way in their own gardens.
Peeing on a compost heap activates the composting process and helps to produce a ready supply of lovely organic matter to add back to the garden.With the ready supply of fallen leaves at this time of year, it’s a great time to get composting. Adding a little pee just helps get it all going; it’s totally safe and a bit of fun too.’
Tamzin Phillips, the National Trust’s Compost Doctor, said: ‘An average flush of the toilet can use anything from four and a half to nine litres of water each time, but what people may not realise is that this water is treated to the same standard as drinking water and shouldn’t be wasted.