Dust?

[Timber_Framer]

OK sawyers
What do you guys do with all that sawdust?
In the timber department I am a part time timber framer who’s just started cutting my own timbers. I had a Sthil 051 with a 36” bar w/ripping chain mounted on an Alaskan III chainsaw mill. My friends call it the wood waster.
Anyway it works great fro cutting beams, but I’m just wondering what you guys that saw lumber for a living or full time hobby do with all that saw dust?

[Brad_S.]

Horse people call all the time looking for planer chips. I give some of my sawdust (sawpowder, really) to one of my clients with a machine shop for oil absorbtion. The rest gets spread on the back 40 to compost.

[Timber_Framer]

I hadn't thought of horse people, thanks

[Bibbyman]

Don't give any walnut sawdust to horse people.  For some reason,  it's bad for them. (The horses, that is.)

[Timber_Framer]

Yeah Bibby I've heard walnut dust isn't good for critters, however there's little chance of me finding any up here. Not that I wouldn't mind finding some, it just ain;t too likely.

[woodmills1]

The horse people around here wont take my sawdust, it is too fine.  When it dries the horses will inhale the dust.  I mix mine in with my topsoil piles and a year later you can't tell.

[Timber_Framer]

Hmm the "dust" fromt eh cahinsaw mill is more like planner shavings. The ripping cahin leaves these long stringy sahvings instead of a short sqaure one like a chisel chain does.

[customsawyer]

Don't know if you have any up there or not but you don't want to mix any black cherry saw dust in with the horses as it will kill them if they eat any.

[Brad_S.]

I have had horse people ask 2 or 3 times whether there was walnut in shavings before loading them, but never said a word about cherry.
Are sure sure you mean black cherry, or black walnut?

[Engineer]

I gotta big pile of sawdust and chips, I add planer shavings and bark chips that I run through my 3 pt chipper, and mix it with horse poo and lime.  After a couple years, that is the best stuff you can spread on the garden.   I'm tempted to plant grade stakes in it to see if I kin get trees...  

[TN_man]

In the winter we use it for bedding for the cows while they are in the barn. We mix oates and corn in with it. Come spring, we turn the pigs loose in the cattle stall and they will turn it upside down trying to get to that fermented corn. After about 8 weeks it will be a nice rich compost that we spread on our fields like fertilizer. It really turns the fields a dark green and adds topsoil at the same time.
During the summer, we spread it with the spreader real thin like on the fields.

[Timber_Framer]

Thanks for the advice guys

[Ron Wenrich]

Cherry has arsenic in it.  But, I believe it is mainly concentrated in the leaves.  Wilted cherry leaves are the suppossed culprit.  Not so much the dust.

My goats wouldn't touch cherry leaves.  Maybe they knew something.  

[customsawyer]

I don't know all the facts on the black cherry. Had a friend that mowed his pasture and there was some black cherry in the edges and he had some of his cows die. Vet said it was from the cherry so I don't mix my cherry saw dust with the rest.

[gmmills]

customsawyer,

      All of our sawdust goes into one pile including cherry. The only exception is walnut.  The walnut dust is mixed in with the bark mulch.
      I'm with Ron on the cherry leaves. I've always been told it's the wilted green leaf that is the problem.

[Cedarman]

When black cherry leaves wilt, prussic acid forms. It is deadly.  When Johson grass gets a frost, it also is very unhealthy for animals.

[pappy]

In the winter months I haul my sawdust/planer shaving dump trailer from the wood shop over to a local beef farmer, he uses it in his feeding stall.  Every so often he cleans the stall, dumps it in a confined concrete storage area then out to his fields in the spring. Chicken and hog farmers also like our shavings.

During the summer months I dump it outback on the tree farm.

As far as some of the sawdust from the band mill, I mix it with some kero and use as fire starter in one of our six wood stoves around this place.  Saves on the kindling, if my firewood is dry enough I don't need any kindling.

I mix about two cups of kero to a five gallon metal or plastic pail of the fine sawdust.  I should say use this mixture to start fires only, don't use on an existing fire or hot coals.

[Gilman]

Just pretend trees didn't exist and some brilliant geneticist poked at a DNA strand until he made a tree.  Could you imagine getting these toxin generating plants approved through the EPA?

[trouter]

All of our dust goes to chicken houses and for cattle bedding.  Never had any problems with cherry/walnut for the dairy side, but I know the horse owners dont want it. I do have one horse owner who gets a load once a month and never had any trouble.

[Danny_S]

Ever watch the movie Shawshank Redemption? You could put it in your pockets and walk around the yard and sprinkle it down the inside of your pantleg onto the ground and no-one will ever realize......