PowerSwitch

Yep, Peak Sawdust is here.

The Credit Crunch has slowed down house building so sawdust is no longer in good supply.

Which means ... that the horsey set no longer have sawdust for their stables ... which means that hay & straw will be in very short supply this winter!

These weird knock on effects are what will finally do us in.

Our local farmer supplying straw (which we buy for strawberry bedding amongst other things) has put the price of a bale up from ?1 to ?1.50 and has totally sold out this year. Fairly sure he had stacks this time last year.

So Peak Compost Loo then. If no one can get sawdust to put in them
No more straw bale urinals
No more straw bale houses

Eat the horses.

JohnB wrote:So Peak Compost Loo then. If no one can get sawdust to put in them

As long as I have a little bit of fuel for the chainsaw I'll have plenty of sawdust. Don't get so much from a bow saw though...

My circular saw generates a goodly amount of sawdust, which I save for my chickens-to-be. Sounds like I'd better get plenty of straw in, though.

JohnB wrote:So Peak Compost Loo then. If no one can get sawdust to put in them

Find a farmer that uses fertiliser. Get the plastic bags off her/him - s/he'll be glad to get rid of a few hundred. They'll last you your life.

Find a sawmill. Fill the bags.

Voila, enough sawdust for years.

and

Grow flowers, collect the petals when they fall off. Beautiful for compost loos!

or

Empty the loo as soon as you've been, to save sawdust. You can use grass clippings as cover material, shredded paper, leaves, oooh all sorts.

Where there's a will, there's a relative.

If you mix sawdust with water and lime (the white powder from the builders' merchant) and then press it onto the internal walls of your dwelling, it dries and sets to form an insulating plaster. Choose the coarsest sawdust - stuff from planers and thicknessers is better than actual saw dust - as you get more airspaces so better insulation. Messy, fun, cheap and effective.

Some of my sawdust is now being used for smoking trout fillets.

Hi there Biff,

Love to know more about your trout smoker - am look at getting myself an Aquaponics system which I'll stock with trout. Smoked trout sound great to me (assuming we can still find some sawdust!)

andrew-l wrote:Hi there Biff,

Love to know more about your trout smoker - am look at getting myself an Aquaponics system which I'll stock with trout. Smoked trout sound great to me (assuming we can still find some sawdust!)

Make sure it's oak and not pine!!!

Hot oak smoked trout straight out of the smoker and onto the plate is absolutely the biz. Possibly the best fish dish in the world*. Works beautifully with mackerel too.

* ok... a matter of taste, but Im a sucker for fish/meat with a smoky flavour

Will shredded paper work with composting loos? I mean, how l-o-n-g is it going to be before we ever reach Peak Paperwork ?

RenewableCandy wrote:Will shredded paper work with composting loos? I mean, how l-o-n-g is it going to be before we ever reach Peak Paperwork ?

It's best mixed in with other stuff, especially on the heap itself as it allows plenty of air spaces. In an indoor loo, you might get a smell if the doings are not covered completely. You should, after an interval of half an hour or so, be able to stick your nose in the loo and only smell pleasant smells. A good mix of leaves, moss, sawdust, shredded paper, shavings etc is fine.

As for peak paperwork, by the available evidence the answer would appear to be 'not in your lifetime'.

skeptik wrote:Make sure it's oak and not pine!!!

Er yes, definitely oak. I should have nmentioned that.

We just used a BBQ - the sort that has a lid. Got the charcoal going. Laid oak shavings over it. Added filleted trout and shut the lid tight.

emordnilap wrote:You can use grass clippings as cover material, shredded paper, leaves, oooh all sorts.

I wouldn't have thought that grass clippings would work very well - too much nitrogen. Sawdust, paper, leaves and other course stuff add carbon to balance the nitrogen in the poo. Grass clippings compost well with added paper and cardboard.

Biff, I had heard that you need heart of oak for smoking, not sapwood. Do you know if that's true?

Apple wood is also good for smoking, and hickory.

kenneal wrote:I wouldn't have thought that grass clippings would work very well - too much nitrogen.

They're fine if they're well mixed with other stuff - or so it seems from our limited experience. Too many clippings together and they get 'boggy' but dry clippings with a good mix of other stuff so far works.

One day I hope we have so few grass clippings that it won't matter anyway. A dream: no grass! (Alright - enough to put a deck chair on). We're trying to encourage herbs to spread like comfrey and turning more and more to productive use or laying fallow.