I found an 8" ceramic pot by the road one day. I haven't used it yet but, score!

A friend was driving the back way home-trying to stay off the highway in rush hour traffic. He went through a small industrial park and spotted a dumpster filled with cedar! Who would throw that out? It came from a small florists shop that had been sold. On the top of all this wood were several perfectly good pieces of cedar lattice in tact. No splintering. All I have to do now is figure where I want to use them. Another great save.

I always want to climb and peek in scrap dumpsters

sallyg said: I always want to climb and peek in scrap dumpsters

Me too but I am always worried I might find a baby, live animals or dead bodies so I don't do it.😟

tigerpaws said: Me too but I am always worried I mind find a baby, live animals or dead bodies so I don't do it.😟

I never thought of that!

sallyg said:

I never thought of that!

You will now! We all will. My son once had a summer job at a restaurant, that included emptying the trash cans. One afternoon, he found five raccoons in a dumpster, that had been there all day, having presumably been trapped the night before. It was a hot July; the animals were in a sorry state. He and another boy made a ramp to get in there with water-soaked tablecloths and rescued them all without mishap. He felt pretty good about that.
I guess you'd feel pretty good if you found a baby and saved it. A body - well, you're not supposed to touch them anyway until the police come, so no problem, just icky.

Someone did dump a body in one here. It was in a construction area so she had been missing for awhile before someone found her. But, it's illegal to "dumpster dive" here.

ick
Probably illegal in general. But we have people get dumpsters in their driveway for major renovation. Probably no one would catch me there.
We had some houses going up- that would be tricky to take from. I just hope the landfill sorts material. Here, I think they do. We have several different dumpsters and sorted bays when you go to the dump.

Hubby looks at eBay a lot to see if something we have is selling. Used set of cheap Tacoma tires on rims does not sell- But the hubcaps/ wheel covers sell around 45$ a set. He just went out to pop those off and will list them.

eBay is fabulous for saving all the stuff that woukd have otherwise gone to the dump.

I did see this website, but have not used it (yet) so no idea if it is good to use:
https://www.freecycle.org/

Craigslist is also good to get free stuff.

I'm sure there's stuff to be had on freecycle. We've gotten things from one of those. People post here on a similar local site, other people usually swamp them with >I'm interested < replies. .

And the neighbors have 2 black metal mesh candle/light holders out for the picking. Looks like they can be hung-they have a brass looking handle. Nice size too. When the old folks next door finally moved to a nursing home their daughter cleaned out the house. It took her 2 1/2 years! they were hoarders however they had some great stuff to pick through. The daughter rented a Bagster and dumped everything in it. These people never threw anything away. There were totes filled with Family Circle magazines dated 20 years ago. 2 complete sets of golf clubs, sheet music, LP 331/3 records, a real map of England from WWII written in German-how much is that worth! The old man liked chemistry, trains, model building and big sailing ships and photography. I found a wood lab vial holder with glass vials and snagged that plus some other pretty cool pictures of birds that I framed. The daughter gave me the tea cart and an 8 drawer chest of drawers which is real wood-not fiber board. I sanded the orangey finish off the drawers and used satin clear poly to seal it. I use it in my bathroom as a make shift linen closet because I don't have one. She also gave me the huge mirror that went with it. The tea cart was also orangey so I spray painted it hammered silver and got cut glass knobs for the drawer. Kept the other original hardware because it was beautiful. This lives in my dining room. The wheels work and it has drop down extension sides. Curb shopped her college dorm frig[from 1983] still works. I use it at work.

I was thinking same ~ go through stuff that used to belong to hoarders. I watch this show on TV where hoarders are forced to clean up their residences and the items just thrown on the dumpster, unbelievable ~ a lot of valuable things, all in good shape. Sounds like you got a lot of good things (no babies or bodies there). At least it was stuff from a neighbor who you knew so you were safe there. Happy hunting.

Tigerpaws they had a mouse infestation! You could smell it when you walked into the house. Just awful-that acrid stale mouse poop smell. yuck. She had diabetes and glaucoma and he had a pacemaker and was not supposed to drive but he did anyway. She was the driver between them. Their car-a Buick of course-had dents and dings all along the rear bumper. She would back out and hit the telephone pole at least once a month. Eventually her dementia became more pronounced and she started hitting the husband with her cane. They both went to an elder care facility and that's when the estranged daughter showed up to get the house back in order.

Sad.

Sucks to be old!
Our friend across the road who moved into a seniors' apartment left a whole lot of stuff behind that she and her husband accumulated a fairly big house over 25 years. The best furniture went to her daughters or the auction, but there was a garage, workshop, basement and two storage rooms. The daughters live far away, so we helped out - and helped ourselves to lumber, tools, cooking utensils, all kinds of things they didn't want and we had somewhere to store. After five years, I'm still passing stuff on to the thrift shops.

About 40 years ago, my husband took the trash off to the dump and the attendant asked if he played chess and if so, someone threw away a nice chess set if he wanted it. So he was able to retrieve all the pieces except one of the kings.

The pieces are made of light and dark lathed wood and the kings stand about 8 inches high. He had a friend make the other king, then about 15 years later, our daughter asked if she could paint them and my husband made the chessboard. Not sure why blue and green were the chosen colors

Different!

The show Hoarders is on TV tonight. Must remember to watch and see all the items that are chucked onto the dumpster that I wouldn't mind having. What bothers me is that all these items are filling up the landfills when they would be perfectly usable once all cleaned/washed up. There are some dumps that have areas where items are salvaged and put out for people tgo come to buy for cheap or free. IMO that is a good idea. Lots of doors, building supplies, etc to be gotten and they are all perfectly usable.

I've tried to watch Hoarders and just can't. I do love American Pickers though. Go figure.

I remember reading a book when I was either 5/6 or 7/8 grade about an African-American family where the grandparents ran the town dump. They were quite frugal, and salvaged everything they could, even finding the pieces of broken dishes and gluing them back together. Can't remember the title.