# What do you do with your collected dust?



## dbhost (Jul 20, 2009)

Now I know this might sound like a pretty silly question, but what do you do with your collected sawdust? Particularly the fines…

I have been beating the tar out of, uh I mean using my planer a LOT this last week, and have generated about 60 gallons of Cedar shavings, and dust. The ultra fines that get past the separator and into the lower bag aren't much to speak of right now, BUT they will add up in the long run…

The stuff that gets in the dust bin, at least with Cedar, well the dust bin gets taken outside, and emptied into the flower beds with the larger chunks of mulch. The shavings and dust gets mixed and watered in to keep flyaway dust to minimum…

The woods I frequently work with so far are SYP (treated and untreated), Cedar, Red Oak, White Oak, Pecan, Mesquite , and Birch, and beech. I am trying to source some Black Walnut, and the various species of Maple (not exactly common in Texas).

I have heard Walnut is poisonous to flowerbeds so I want to make sure I don't have the dust from that, or PT pine in the mix for the flowerbeds. But what else can I do with this stuff other than burn it, or put it in a landfill?


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## lew (Feb 13, 2008)

Aromatic Cedar shavings (from the planer) can be put into cloth bags for pet bedding. The smell is pleasant and the shavings make a soft pillow.


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## cwdance1 (Jun 23, 2009)

Most of my wood is pine and oak so I add it to my compost pile with all the other goodies. So far its doing great.


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## firecaster (Jan 15, 2009)

I compost everything but PT. That goes in the trash.


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## rejr (Jun 24, 2008)

+1 on composting. Stir it in with shredded paper and household garbage in a bin and add worms.


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## RouterManiac (Jun 1, 2009)

Yeah the compost pile gets all of mine unless i am cutting MDF, then I scoop up the real stuff and throw away the mdf.


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## DaneJ (Aug 13, 2009)

My wife uses it for mulch in her flower boxes and gardens…


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## okwoodshop (Sep 15, 2009)

my lab uses it for bedding she really loves


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## JasonWagner (Sep 10, 2009)

OK, I'll be the first to say I put it in my shop trash and pitch it. I don't make as much saw dust as a lot of you guys. It's usually a mix of MDF, plywood and hardwoods. It's not like throwing plastic bottles and diapers in the landfill, it'll degrade pretty quickly. One member suggested blowing it into my attic for insulation then applying for a tax credit.


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## matt1970 (Mar 28, 2007)

I just threw two full bags into our city's yard waste which does not go into the landfill but gets used for compost and other things…my goal is to switch to my own compost pile but I have not built an area in our yard makeover…YET!


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## dbhost (Jul 20, 2009)

Now yard waste recycling is a good idea. I hadn't thought of that. I use a lot of ply, but very little MDF. Most of my dust / shavings though are from solid stock that I mentioned above… Composting would be a good thing, but isn't gonna happen on my property. Not enough land…


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## rrdesigns (Sep 4, 2009)

Composting is the way to go. Just don't put it immediately onto your flower beds uncomposted. It will suck the nutrients right out of the soil (heard this tip from the garden guy on NPR).


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## chriswright (Nov 13, 2008)

My father composts all his sawdust, including MDF and plywood. Mine ends up in the dumpster.


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## Richforever (Mar 19, 2008)

I have a special pile in the back yard for the saw dust. The goal is to make it as big as my yard waste piles.

When people see it and ask, "What's that?", I can talk about my projects that I've done. (Married guys might not be able to do stuff like this, i.e. building piles in the back yard.)


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## a1Jim (Aug 9, 2008)

It's a great substitute for flower in cakes LOL


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## sandhill (Aug 28, 2007)

Yea I think the land fills can use all the organic material they can get. It don't produce methane


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## SnowyRiver (Nov 14, 2008)

I compost all of mine too except for the decay resistant stuff like cedar. That I take and mix it with wax and pour it into empty egg cartons, let if harden, break out each compartment, and use it for fire starters for camping and my fireplace.


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## KentS (May 27, 2009)

We fill a trailer 5' x 8' x 6' about once a week. Horse stables use it for bedding in their stalls. It's a win-win for all involved. We get shavings hauled off for free, and they get shavings for free.


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## Berg (Aug 31, 2009)

I am sure the stable checks what species of wood are in there (?). I have heard some species are bad for livestock (not just PT). 
In NH I live in a rural area. I drag my bag of shavings and dust out back and walk through the woods leaving a trail that magically diappears over a couple of months. I don't have that luxury in FL. I like the yard waste/compost idea. I should check with the city.


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## Durnik150 (Apr 22, 2009)

I mentionied this last week in another forum so I'll mention it here since it applies. Don't but uncomposted walnut dust on your garden. Walnut trees create a chemical in their roots that inhibits growth in nearby trees. It comes from competion for sunlight in the upper canopy. The wood carries traces of this chemical and it will hurt if not kill other plant life. I think composting it leeches out the bad stuff and makes it usable but I'm not sure.
I use all but the walnut for composting. Regretfully for my wife's garden, I work in a lot of Walnut.


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## closetguy (Sep 29, 2007)

I give mine to a pottery maker. He uses a method where he buries the pottery in the saw dust and sets it on fire to smolder. I don't remember what it's called, but it is an alternative method of kiln firing.


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## mmh (Mar 17, 2008)

I compost the dust. My compost pile is 5'x10' and if I want to use it as mulch in the soggier pathways, that works too. Be careful with the nut tree shavings/dust as they contain a toxin that allows the trees to inhibit other plant growth so they don't have to compete with understory plants. You can compost this OK, as chances are you'll have a small percentage of walnut to your compost pile and the process may break it down.

As for adding dust directly to plant beds, wood shavings require nitrogen to break down so they would deplete the soil of nitrogen, thus starving your growing plants. Mulch that is naturally brown from decomposing will not do this. The "fake" mulch made from wood shavings and sprayed brown with a strange smelling chemical will also leach the nitrogen out of the soil and starve the plants. This stuff also smells really bad and I've seen it used frequently by commercial landscapers because it's cheap and the client is clueless.

Pure cedar shavings that are consistently soft could be used for bedding for animals.


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## reggiek (Jun 12, 2009)

I would have to add myself to the compost crowd. I mix into the pile for most…and use some on the soil surface in areas I don't want the weeds to grow in. I use the walnut along fence lines and around the house as it does inhibit the plant growth - I do pour some of it along walkways to keep the weeds down. I also have alot of horses nearby and the owners are more than happy to come take the bigger shavings when I have them (the finer stuff is just as hazardous to animals as it is to us…so I only have the bigger stuff when I turn or plane). I don't think I have ever thrown out any of the sawdust I have created.


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## Dustmite97 (Aug 1, 2009)

My DC uses clear plastic disposable collection bags. I haven't had to empty it yet because all I generate is sawdust. When the time comes I will just remove the bag, tie it up and put it out at the curb for garbage pick-up. I also have a composter so I might use that too.


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## longgone (May 5, 2009)

Burn pile in back of yard


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