Poisonous wood shavings??

[TheEquineOak]

My OH turns wood in his spare time and I was wondering if, instead of sticking all the loose shavings in the bin, I can stick it down for the horse.

Any particular wood poisonous to horses?

Thanks

 

[jedge]

There is one type that causes laminitis according to some scientific journals. Off the top of my head it's black walnut? But it may just occur in USA from what I recall.

 

[Petalpoos]

If he is using hard wood then I would be more concerned about the shavings being 'sharp' and /or dusty.

 

[Boxers]

'Back in the day' in the late 80's early 90's my friend and I bedded our horse on shavings collected from a couple of woodyards in our town, we never had any problems and the bonus was, they were free!

 

[TheEquineOak]

Thanks for your replies!

It's all sorts of wood but nothing too hard in my opinion. Better than chucking it away

 

[Enfys]

There is one type that causes laminitis according to some scientific journals. Off the top of my head it's black walnut? But it may just occur in USA from what I recall.

Yes, Black Walnut shavings are not to be used for bedding. Great for furniture, bad for bedding.

 

[TheEquineOak]

Yes, Black Walnut shavings are not to be used for bedding. Great for furniture, bad for bedding.

OH says that if he ever managed to get hold of some black walnut, the horse is having none of it!!!

We were conerned about Yew.

 

[Fiagai]

Yes Yew and oak contain alkaloids that can be dangerous...however softwood shavings should be fine.

 

[Archina]

'Back in the day' in the late 80's early 90's my friend and I bedded our horse on shavings collected from a couple of woodyards in our town, we never had any problems and the bonus was, they were free!

Ditto!! years ago we used to go pick up huge canvas bags of shavings for the horses, was awesome as it was free! Also never had any problems

 

[newbie_nix]

Another one to add to the steer clear of list is Black locust - Robinia pseudoacacia or 'false acacia' as any part of it is apparently deadly for horses.

I have heard some people use it for fence posts and or furniture. Not sure if used much for turning but just thought I would mention anyway...

Also I think I heard prunus species (cherry etc) can be toxic? Not sure if this is just the leaves or the wood as well though....

 

[Box_Of_Frogs]

Should be fine but do be aware that it won't be dust-extracted like the pre packaged stuff you buy these days. My experience from previous yard that collected tons of freebie shavings from a local firm is that a bagful will create a monumental amount of dust. It coats everything including water buckets, all flat surfaces and your own lungs. God knows what it would do to a dust allergy or COPD horse. Dust extracted is always preferable but small quantities should be ok.

 

[Enfys]

OH says that if he ever managed to get hold of some black walnut, the horse is having none of it!!!

QUOTE]

Is it hard to get hold of in the UK? I have 8 x 60' trees around my house and hundreds of saplings throughout my woods. The only reason we don't harvest the mature trees is that they give excellent shade in summer, shame that they also give a monster crop of walnuts which are flipping useless...but the squirrels eat well in winter. This is 20 minutes work, we collected 157 buckets from just the front lawn this Fall

 

[Renvers]

Ditto!! years ago we used to go pick up huge canvas bags of shavings for the horses, was awesome as it was free! Also never had any problems

me too! The owner of the local woodyard thought it was great we would turn up and take them as they were just waste! Oh, how times have changed

 

[Aoibhin]

ditto to the free shavings from woodmills & grandfather also took trailer apon traiiler load of the sawdust from the extractor too, it was all tipped into the same area & rolled out with the tractor & made a fantastic lunging pen surface once watered down. we got so much of it that the pen area was a good 4ft deep & he often dropped it into gateways in winter to soak up the water from the mud.

 

[TheEquineOak]

Is it hard to get hold of in the UK? I have 8 x 60' trees around my house and hundreds of saplings throughout my woods. The only reason we don't harvest the mature trees is that they give excellent shade in summer,

I don't think we have Black Walnut! If we do I've certainly never come across it.

He doesn't produce enough for us to use it as a full bed, just a little bit to top his current bed up Trying to look after pennies...

 

[Gingersmum]

I think the poisonous issue is more about the preservatives used on the wood rather than the type of wood. We have a carpenter on site and he said some preservatives are arsenic based.