Hope this wasn't a forum member

I read that this AM, ashes in a bag?

That reminds me of what happened when the ashes were put in a pizza box and put out on the front porch!
See story here in Mont Vernon NH
https://www.hearth.com/talk/threads...-porch-guess-what-happened.65539/#post-819668

bogieb said:

Bag of Pellet Ashes Causes Fire

Guessing not - but a cautionary tale for any new members that may not have seen any of the Ash Vac and/or Ash Can posts.

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I have a friend who is a retired fireman and he used a plastic shop vac as his stove vac. The difference was he set it on the middle of his lawn and in the morning all that was left was the handle and parts of the motor. It was a good thing it happened in the winter as the snow kept it under control. He did buy a metal ash vac after that. The point was being a fireman he knew the dangers and yet was careless once.

I've never used an ash vac in 30 years. I've always used an ordinary shop vacuum (Shop Vac Brand) with a drywall bag inside and just recently upgraded to a stainless contractor model because my older plastic one finally petered out.

A couple times I sucked up a hot potato but I just removed the bag and tossed it out in the yard., never cremated the whole vacuum.

I can't see spending the money for an ash vacuum myself.

Okay, I must be missing something here. I've vacuumed a 'few' pellet stoves and even wood stoves with a regular shop vac and never even considered doing it when it was hot. What is the advantage of doing it when it's hot?

Absolutely nothing unless you are in a BIG hurry. You and I aren't, obviously.

Cleaned out the wood stove yesterday and it had not been fired in over three days and still a hot spot. I have used a shop vac with bag and a filter for many years without issue. MN and Dakotas are in a severe fire alert and winds over 40 are not helping. Three homes went up in one fire and were gone in under 15 minutes.

Sounds like a low yield year for your growers. Raining like heck here, supposed to snow (dirty word) here tomorrow.... Your subsoil moisture is probably non-existent with no appreciable snowfall this winter. Hows the well doing?

Well is deep at 88 feet so the deep sub soil is ok yet. Treating it right now with chlorine. Friend was finishing a field today to plant wheat and looked more like a dirty fire moving across field. Nearby river is slowing to a minor creek so carp shooting wont happen for another year as last year it was at flood stage. Locals are getting government loans for crop loss last year because of both flooding and drought. Wet till July then almost nothing since. Prepping for test for smoke chaser for DNR or Forestry service as if no rain next week it will be very busy fire season.

88 isn't all that deep. I had to have mine run down to 110 back when we were going through dry years. So fat, so good though. I don't likie chloring, I use H2O2 injected with a postive displacement pump right into the raw water line. Kills everything (my quality tests always come back negative everything) and it mitigates the ferric iron too. We have a touch.

No field work here yet. Too wet and too cool.

My friend in Duluth is gonna have his butt in the ringer on hay this year.

80% of the fields are now without snow cover. I took a walk out back yesterday and found a bunch of my bee hives had died off. Last year I didn't lose any. The horses want out back in the worst way, the five foot drifts are melting down to less than two feet deep now, I may let them out back to shake out the cobwebs today.

As I cleaned the stove yesterday a thought came to mind, of some improperly disposed of ashes. The local county transfer station has HUGE signs stating ABSOLUTELY NO ASHES. This followed an episode of someone throwing out their ashes in the huge roll off's the county has, one of them ignited and about burned the building down.

I also wondered if the pellet ash is still viable for dispersement as a source of Potash in the fields? I've always put my wood stove ash out as soon as the snow melts. I'm burning clean pellets, so I would assume so, any thoughts?

A couple three years ago, I put my ashes in the garden and tilled them in, in the spring and where the ashes were concentrated the most, my green beans didn't do squat, so now I just toss them in the driveway, it's gravel anyway...

SidecarFlip said:

A couple three years ago, I put my ashes in the garden and tilled them in, in the spring and where the ashes were concentrated the most, my green beans didn't do squat, so now I just toss them in the driveway, it's gravel anyway...

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Sparingly spread about or mixed into the compost, then spread and plowed in would a be a better formula. As you noted "concentrated" meant they were getting too much phosphorus, strong vibrant roots and not much energy for the fruit. I grow cover crops after I apply amendments, if the cover crops are growing well so will the veggies. If they're having issues, other than a spot here and there, I will do a minor soil analysis or send out for a soil test.

I do soil analysis all the time, I have to, I farm. In the garden, it usually gets some left over urea in the form of cattle manure. The ash thing was spontaneous, not planned. I've never been an advocate of ashes in the garden when they do just as well in the driveway. When I have a field tested, I call the co-op and have them to the testing and then amend as required.

SidecarFlip said:

I can't see spending the money for an ash vacuum myself.

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There was a post last fall where the Powersmith ash vac was like around $60. Pretty inexpensive IMO and glad I got it so I don't have to lug the much bigger and louder shop vac around.

Mine is on wheels. I don't lug it. My shop vac will suck a ping pong ball through 20 geet of garden hose...........

bogieb said:

Bag of Pellet Ashes Causes Fire

Guessing not - but a cautionary tale for any new members that may not have seen any of the Ash Vac and/or Ash Can posts.

Click to expand...

To bad. careless

SidecarFlip said:

I've never used an ash vac in 30 years. I've always used an ordinary shop vacuum (Shop Vac Brand) with a drywall bag inside and just recently upgraded to a stainless contractor model because my older plastic one finally petered out.

A couple times I sucked up a hot potato but I just removed the bag and tossed it out in the yard., never cremated the whole vacuum.

I can't see spending the money for an ash vacuum myself.

Click to expand...

my HD cheap light weight 2 gallon jober..
sock is free.... catches all the dust....
never enough ash in a pellet stove to lug around a big ass canister...and I have a 61 BTU rig.'
most times I use a 2" stiff paint brush and do all the walls,ledges etc
and send it all down to the ash pan..