Please comment below if you recycle your ash and how! Thanks for commenting!

Am I a homesteader? No Do I have a wood stove? No Do I even own a shovel? No Did I watch this video to the end? Yes!

You can also use it to make soap. My farmer ancestors 3-4 generations back would collect lye from ash by boiling ash in some water, letting it settle, & skimming the lye from the top. Then they’d mix the lye with rendered animal fat/grease leftover from cooking, and then boil it down into a thick mush and pour it into a tub and cut the resultant solidified mixture into bars of soap.

I have been cleaning these boilers for over 20 years and I would strongly advise you to use a respirator when dealing with fine wood ash particulates in the air when cleaning one of these units. Trust me

We keep a bucket of ash in the outhouse to sprinkle into the hole after use. Works great to help decomposition and keep smells down.

Ash was used in making cement blocks. That's where the word "cinder" block came from.

Clean windows with it? Sounds like a pane in the ash. That's all I got

I blown away at the ash cleaning up oil in the garage...then the knowledge just kept on coming. Thank you for sharing!!

I'm from the Northwest Territories, Canada and we also use ash for vehicles that are stuck in either snow or ice. Just lay a line of ash in front of your traction tires and your slipping and sliding is reduced to pulling you out..amazing..great video.. btw

You should really specify, that before using ash as a fertilizer, you should find out your soil's pH level. Ash is alkaline, it will raise it, so if you already have an alkaline soil, it'll make it unbearable for plants and you'll end up killing your garden. Also it depends on what you grow, some plants prefer acidic soil, some alkaline.

This is old school, but when making leather from a deer or cow skin a 7 to 10 day soak in a hard wood ash and water mixture will cause the hair to release from the skin so that the leather can be scraped and tanned.

We burn clippings and thinning from the woods and run three burn barrels all Spring and Fall. We end up with about 300lbs of fine white ash. This is perfect for increasing the strength of concrete that we are using on the European wood fired bread oven. What this means is no crumbling or cracking and popping off of bricks over the years as we fire the box for bread and pizza. Any left over goes first to the garden and second to the compost pile. Every third year we mix it with the fertilizer and spread in on the fields before over planting.

I made a compost toilet and used ash instead of soil. It was brilliant 😁

Wood ash has been used historically for making lye, a key ingredient for making soap. Ash from harder wood species is preferable.

Me an Australian who doesn't even own a heater: Ah yes interesting

I use it on muddy paths, especially where the dogs walk. Keeps the ground solid. I also put it in the bottom of pot holes on our dirt road before adding gravel, over time its like cement and keeps the gravel from disappearing which is a big deal in our super rainy environment. .

hippees at a rainbow gathering in a forest taught me that ash is great to keep the flies away from the poop pit apply a good sprinkiling over your deposited business after you've done your business and it greatly reduses the flies.... I don't know the science behind it

I use my wood ash to melt snow and ice in the driveway where it slopes to the road. I found that ice on my walks instantly were safer with only a the lightest sprinkle of ash. I didn't want to track a lot of it in the house or for my dogs to get a lot of it on their feet. I call it "instant traction" because it really works instantly. I carry a jar of it in the car during winter so if I come across an icy parking lot, I can walk safely. I also spread it over snow on my driveway and it melts the snow quite well. I now have new uses for it. Thank You!

My father used to clean his gun with ash and oil on patches to remove lead fowling... apparently something he picked up in WW2 where they used cigarette ash and oil to clean the bores and remove rust spots on the outside before turnout inspection. We used ash from the fire pit on our veg patch and to sprinkle on the compost heap, it's high in potassium and reduces soil acidity.

My husband has been using an outdoor woodburning stove for 20 plus years. He puts most of the ashes on the dirt driveway for fill. I have 1 very good tip that I hope people will do: use a metal/steel wheelbarrow, not a metal can. Reason being: you can wheel it instead dealing with a cumbersome metal can. My husband hasn't used anything else for ashes. Just a heavy duty metal wheelbarrow.

I live in an old steel town in Western Pennnsylvania. When I was a kid, the street department always used to spread cinders on the streets. The cinders were crushed up slag from the blast furnaces at the steel mill. The use of salt didn't really replace it until the seventies. We also had a coal furnace. I spent a lot of very cold mornings scraping out the previous days ashes and building new fires.

Note to Western U.S. gardeners: If you live in a desert area, most soil is very alkaline. You do not want to dump the ash into the garden, as this increases the alkalinity, thus reducing the viability of the soil for plants. If you have any question as to pH of soil, test it. Good for Western soils is plenty of organic matter that is composted. Do not put ash on acid loving plants like raspberries/blackberries. Take fallen needles from pine trees and spread on soil around berry plants. This helps acidify the soil and the plants will thank you with the fruit they produce.

when I lived in a Cabin out in Alaska, we threw ash down hole in the outhouse. Keeps the smell down Alot!

I've used ash from my campfire to brush my teeth and it actually works really well...especially if you forget your toothpaste...you have to use the really fine, fluffy grey ash though. This was a good informative video. Even if we didn't have a woodstove at them time, we've always carried a small container of ash in the back of the Jeep...if you get stuck on a sheet of ice, just a little ash under each wheel and you be able to pull right off the ice.

Things I thought most people would know about.... But it's always good to get updated. When I was a kid , my grandparents and my parents used to mix ash into flower beds and maybe once a week go out the far fields and scatter ash as a mineral additive . 👍👍

Here's something I learned and pass on to others. Even though the outdoor furnace is insulated, if you build a small, 3-sided structure around it you will reduce your fuel usage by 1/3. That is considerable. The structure keeps more wind away from the furnace so it doesn't have to fight against it as much. Plus you can store your wood right there next to it under the roof.

Sift the ash through a mesh strainer, then rinse the ash with clean water. It can then be applied to ceramic pottery and fired in a kiln for a glaze finish to your pots.

Ax gash cut on elders leg (young man then) in 1920's, packed wound with wood ash and spider webs on top of it, wrapped up, back to cutting wood. Healed magnificently. Great video, thanks!

Use as border edging around the yard. Edges where you have to weedeat. I use around things like a septic tank lid. You always have to come back and weedeat or use grass killers around things like that so I started dumbing ash/coals around edges enough to suppress grass. Works pretty well. I also used around my garage's block foundation and looks good all summer without weedeating or poison.

Back when we still mostly had front wheel drive cars, I was taught instead of a bag of sand, carry a plastic tub of fireplace ash in trunk. Ash works like salt when you are stuck on ice and car tires keep spinning. Just broadcast around tires and on the path you want to go, it saved my butt many times. I also sprinkled on my patio and sidewalk going out to the mailbox when icy, it immediately makes a safe surface to walk on and melts the ice.

My grandmother made ash or lye soap. She started a fire, got her mother's old iron pot and boiled the water threw in the soap and we washed our clothes that way. She raised me off grid . We always used ash in the garden.

I used your tip for cleaning the glass on my wood burner and it worked a treat! The glass was really dark with soot and now it’s clear. Many thanks for that… 😊

ANOTHER LIST OF USES 1. Putting wood ash on an ants nest forces them to relocate…the ash seems to cause them problems so they pack and leave. 2. A pan of ash in the corner of a basement or other dark area will deter mice and roaches. I’ve never tried this one but I’m assured by a friend that it works. 3. Decent sized lumps of wood charcoal will filter impurities out of water. A lot of water filters out there actually rely on different forms of processed wood ash for such. 4. Wood ash in a metal or ceramic container will dehumidify a damp space very well. 5. Putting ash on a fire will snuff the flames instantly. We actually keep a decorative bucket of it near the fireplace just in case an ember hits the carpet. 6. Neutralize acidic soil by adding wood ash to the ground. You don’t want to use this around tender, young plants though, as it’s too potent and will kill them off. 7. Sprinkling wood ash around the edge of a young plant bed will deter slugs and snails from having a midnight feast. These slimy pests don’t like the drying effect ash has on their undersides. Make sure to re-apply after rain. 8. At up to 70%, calcium carbonate wood ash can replace lime in a pinch. 9. If you keep chickens, ash mixed with sand makes a great dust bath for the birds. 10. You can even make soap from wood ash. Here’s a recipe you may want to give a try. 11. Ash on paths and driveways both prevents slipping and melts ice. It’s messy as can be though, so make sure you have a mat by the front door for boots to be wiped on before coming indoors. A bag of ash in the trunk is also great for giving some grip if you get into a wheels-spinning-but-going-nowhere situation. 12. The mildly abrasive nature of ash makes it excellent for cleaning up dull silver, other metals, and cloudy glassware. Make a thick paste and rub lightly. Leave the goop on for a few minutes and then polish off. Always wear gloves when you’re doing this though - ash is caustic. 13. Wood ash neutralizes bad smells. This means it’s great for home gyms, sheds, garages, or anywhere that teenagers congregate. Make sure you replace with fresh ash every few days. 14. Ash can blot up oil stains on drives and floors. Put the ask on the stain, stomp it in, leave for a few minutes and brush up. 15. If your four-legged friend got too close to a skunk help all you need is some ash. Rub the ash into the dogs coat, let him run around a while, and then brush him. This is the less tomato-y means of eliminating eau de skunk. 16. You can use ash to control algae in your pond. Just 1 tablespoon of ash per 1000 gallons of water improves the robustness of aquatic plants and inhibits algae growth. 17. Ash can clean glass on oven and wood stove doors. Make a thick paste, slap it on, and wait a while. Scrape off the excess and then polish. 18. Clean your teeth with pure wood ash - not ash from painted, varnished or treated wood. Clean your teeth with a dab of ash on the brush, rinse well and feel how clean they are. Just be aware that there can be negative health effects from long-term use of ash in this way.

When we lived out on a farm in Western Kansas and we used ash from our fireplace to keep the smell and flies down in the outhouse.

I’ve used it for years to clean the glass on the fireplace, but I just dampen a few paper towels, and dip them right in the ash of the fireplace. Makes its own paste. Also, ash is great to dump down outhouses to keep the smell down.

THANK YOU SO MUCH! Because I watched your video a couple of months ago, I not only was able to use ash on my soil and compost, but as a snow/ice melt during some heavy storms here. Also provides great traction. 👍🏽

Omg! Thank you. I don't know If you know how refreshing you are! Needed you at this time in my life. God bless!

Soak the ashes in water to extract lye water. It can be used to make soap. Lye water can also be used in Nixtamalization, the process of turning corn into hominy and dried then ground to grits and also masa for tortillas and tamales.

My grandma used wood ash not only for fertilizer but it's all she ever used for pesticide by sifting it to get the finest ashes which she would put in an old stocking and shake onto her plants.

I've read to many useful comments and now consider this video my tutorial for ash use. Cheers. Good video and many good user comments.

At home in Holland,I when I was young, we used the ash from the cole stove for repairing the driveway. We, now in Portugal, use our ashes for the garden, together with coffeeground, eggshells and finely cut banana peels.

Just a tip, if you sit your full shovel of ashes at the bottom of the bucket and just pull it out letting the ashes slide off you will eliminate most of the ash cloud.

Here in Idaho we save the ash and when the dry weather is getting close we put a barrier of Ash around the property up against the foundation bugs really don't like crawling through it

I have been using ash in my garden and around my Rose of Sharon. It is amazing when you recycle how God makes it all work for you. Thanks for sharing nice Homestead!

I love these comments it’s so informative. I’ve always known ashes could make paint/ink but never soap.. I smoke weed pretty much every day and I’ve recently started trying to save my ashes and not dump them out. Something told me that dumping out my ashes are a waste and that I should just throw out the ends/buds. I really don’t know where I got the idea it just came to me out of nowhere. And now I found this video with a bunch of great ideas. Thanks!

I use ash to clean my stove window, sprinkle it on icy walks and driveway, and when I'm taking it out of the stoves I put a colander over the top of the bucket and let the fine ash sift into the bucket and keep the small chunks of charcoal out. I put the charcoal in another bucket and use it in the summer in the BBQ grill to cook food. I save some of the fine ash to make soap.

Dude is working his ash off

Pretty handy as a wound dressing…wood ash enhances healing and also acts as an antiseptic- just make sure there’s no tanalised (treated) timber been burnt amongst it. Another good wound dressing is moss

I've used it for my stove glass for years. But I live in Oregon where the water is extremely hard so I tried it on my windows and it worked great. I also tried it recently on my car's headlights. Just like a charm!!

I use ash when camping to keep bugs away from my tent. Sprinkle it around the base of the tent and ants, spiders, etc., will avoid it.

Great video. I know that in some very dry areas where there is little water, people use ash to wash dishes. Turning "waste" into something valuable is golden, and something we should all do more of. Thanks for the great video!

Neat Ideas, My father is a retired Chimney Sweep and as a kid he would drag me around to all the jobs with him. My only only advice to you is to wear a mask when dealing with large amounts of ash like that or coal. really fine particles get in the air and then in your lungs. that's not good. Good video though I love the idea of learning how other people do stuff :)

Works great also for stainless steel pans and takes off kitchen baked on grease very well.

I found that over the years of using ash on my garden, I got it too alkaline to the point I was having problems growing certain vegetables. I had to add sulfur to the garden to bring the pH back to more neutral . I would suggest having your soil tested every year when using wood ashes on your garden.

Old settlers use ash to fill in cracks and holes on their homes or cabins. They would add dirt to the ash anf add water so that it bonded better together and hardened. Great way to fill in cracks in concrete, or to make a slab if that's all you have. Take longer to cure but lasts longer than concrete that is made today

Best and easiest way to clean the glass door on my wood stove I’ve ever used. I love to see the flames !

My house caught on fire, & all the rose bushes on side of my home bloomed tall & beautiful right after. We had a hard time maintaining then prior to the fire. I believe they grew faster from ash falling from edge of home help my roses bloom like never before.

If your car gets stuck, use ash instead of sand for traction. There is nothing better! A coffee tin full in the trunk of your car pairs well with your survival kit in the winter.

I've always saved my ash from my fireplace. I do live in a typical So. California neighborhood and some of my neighbors think I'm nuts. I keep a bucket of it to put out a fire. I use it for my garden, oil spills and lots of other things. I learned all that from my mother that's Japanese from her WWII days.

Oh wow. We started using wood burner oven this year after 20-plus years on propane. We also have a homestead and veggie garden. Thanks much for the useful info!!!!

Cautionary tip: White ash is mostly Calcium Oxid CaO, with a VERY high Ph. Darker ash tends to have more Calcium Carbonate, which is an only mildly alkaline salt - the mild abrasive used on the stove window is also likely to be around 12 Ph, on par with sodium Hypochlorite (aka bleach). On soils that are recently cleared pine barren, reclaimed swamp, or part of the spoil of a mining operation, plenty of ash might be just what it needs to balance Ph .. but if you test your soil at a 7 or higher, you won't be doing your garden any favors by adding ashes. We use it to make hominy, so we can turn our homegrown corn into delicious an nutritious tortillas!

In the 1500s ash was strained, with water, through layers of cloth; this was repeated and the resulting clear liquid was quite a harsh detergent/alkaline bleach for laundry. ❤🇬🇧

The Trick is to Put the Metal Can downwind of where you’re standing so the Ash blows away from you, not on to you

That’s a good tip about the wood stove glass, I’ll try that this winter. I use ash in my driveway every winter, works great in ice!

Plugs up groundhog holes nicely. Found out by accident that it hardens like cement. I needed a place to dump stove ash and there was a ground hog hole large enough to break a leg so it seemed like a good spot

When I got my house, the old folks there used to dump all the firepit ash in their flowerbeds, no plants there, but lots of ash, we tore those beds apart and made a garden outta it, and some construction site topsoil from down the alley. I have never seen such huge carrots in my life, ash is awesome in the garden. Carrots as thick as my wrists, potatoes were great, corn was great, just wow......

7:45 I use mine on my driveway too. I get extra traction with the nails from the pallets I burn. 😁

We use it in the chicken coop to let them dust bathe in the winter- they love it! Also spread it on our hay fields. I have also aged cheese in wood ash- making sure the cheese rind is nice and dry first.

I have a bucket of ash and was wondering what I can do with it just today. Glad my phone can read my mind. Thx for the great tips!

I have always put it on my drive way it's great for traction in the winter.

my grandmother used it on the garden for decades. it builds up the soil very well.

When I was a teenager I worked as a "shampoo girl" at the local beauty shop. The ladies who got their gray hair dyed did not like the "evidence" that was left behind (the dye would stain their skin). The boss had me use the ash from the ashtrays to remove hair dye from the customer's hairline. First I washed the hair when it was time to remove the dye. Then, I took an old towel and my index finger into an old towel and dampened it just a bit and then collected all the ash from the ashtray that would stick to it and rubbed it all around the forehead, neckline and outer ears.

Melting ice on the driveway. I KNEW IT! When I was a kid I would spread ash on our driveway in the winter if it was icy. I told my Dad that it worked and he told me that I had to be wrong. I thought that perhaps the sun would hit it and that's why it melted. I didn't know why, but I knew it was working! VINDICATION!

Yesterday I cleaned the ash out of my firepit and today youtube suggested this video.

Step one when emptying ashes into a container: check which way the breeze is blowing and move your container down wind.

Depending on what type of wood you're burning you can leach or filter caustic lye from the ashes. Potash ( potassium hydroxide from softwood ash ) or soda ash ( sodium hydroxide from hardwood ash). Drill holes in the bottom of a metal barrel, make sure it's not a soft metal barrel. Line the bottom of the barrel inside with straw. You need a collector barrel at the bottom. Now shovel dry ashes into the barrel until overtime the barrel is almost full roughly 6 inches from the top. Pour water into the ashes with the collector barrel at the bottom. The water with the caustic that leached out of the ashes will eventually filter through the straw filter bed at the bottom and go through the drilled holes in the bottom of the top barrel and drip into the filter barrel. You can test the strength of the caustic by putting and egg in the filtrate. If the egg floats upward you have a very high caustic level. You may need to transfer the caustic liquid into another barrel depending on the size of the barrel. You can even put a tap close to the bottom to transfer some liquid out. Caustic lye or Potash has many uses. Hot lime, soap making soft soap ( Potash) hard soap ( soda ash), white wash. Making detergents. Bio diesel process, processing olives and the list goes on.

Great Video! I use my ash for my garden and patching holes in my yard. I was surprised at how well it can clean glass in your video! Thank You!

I use my ash around the base of my house to get rid of Ants coming into the house. It really does work!

If you have an outdoor "long drop" toilet, you can mix the wood ash with sawdust and sprinkle the mixture into the toilet once you have done your business and it helps stop smells and also speeds up the composting process

For fertilizer, mix it up with compost and just let it sit for a few weeks outside to let the Ph settle. If you add a LOT of ash to a garden without much organic material, then raised Ph might be a concern, but adding a couple shovelfuls to a garden bed with lots of compost shouldn't change the Ph over the long run. Compost is the great equalizer.

Great info. I have been using my ash for my garden for years.

My man!! You just got a subscriber and a follower. The “clean the glass with the ash” trick!!! The story is long but suffice it to say, you ended it for me today. My fireplace glass went from fully opaque to clear, we can see the flames. Thank you!

TIP: I use mineral oil (with a small paint brush) on my wood boiler door gaskets every third time I do a cleanout. They swell back up and It makes them last a really long time with a good seal. Otherwise they get cooked from the heat they are exposed to.

When camping, I keep some ash for when I can't light a fire to boil water, the ash can be used like a filter for river-water, not as good as fire but it will help remove impurities and make water safer to drink.

Had friends, in western Colorado, who cleaned the wood burner into a five gallon, metal bucket. The bucket set outside, in freezing temperatures, for three days and felt cold to the touch. Bucket was emptied into the chicken enclosure and spread out somewhat. Two in the morning, they were awakened by strange light coming through the windows. The chicken coop was totally engulfed in flames, with eighteen inches of snow on top of it. Only took one small coal, scratched over to the building by the chickens, to set the coop on fire. Be VERY sure that those ashes are ABSOLUTEY cold.

I don’t even have any and I watched this through. I think my favorite tip was the cleaning for the door. That was neat. The oil cleanup was cool too.

I use the ash-water paste to clean really greasy frying pans or dishes. If vegetable oil ever gets left more than a day on a dish in a warm environment it can end up like plastic and you'd ruin any brush or cloth if you used soap. You just can't shift that goo, except with a tissue or rag dipped into the ash paste. I've also managed at lest partially to deodorise jar twist-top lids which came off pickles and sauces so I can re-use for storing dehydrated food. Just left the lids in the ash for a few weeks. Great stuff. Love the oil stain absorbing idea. I've used chalk in the past to get oil stains out of wood, but think ash would work better.

I have excessive amounts of fireplace ash. This video was great. As for cleaning glass an people being concerned about it scratching. He didn’t tell you to clean. A bay window, but the fireplace window. The creosote that builds up is really hard to remove and I have resorted to a razor blade which likely would do more damage than wet ashes. I am looking forward to clean fireplace trying ashes next time. My birds, all of them absolutely love ash bathes and I think it also keeps off pests.

I use my ash mainly for melting snow, but only in NO foot traffic areas. Also, is great as a traction aid. I keep a five gallon bucket in my vehicles just in case.

I put ashes on my cabin floor and sweep every where with them. No mice bugs in the cabin easily for a year. Warrior of truth Garry.

I dumped my ash on my hedges during winter. They stay on top until the snow melts, which helps deliver the ash to the roots. it's the perfect time and method. My hedges came back like never before and grew to 12 feet tall!

About to buy some land and going to be homesteading I'll very much thank you for this great tips for ash to reuse.!

I've used my fireplace ash for weed control til my hubby threw a fit. He doesn't like the "look of it" in the winter months! Now I just put it where he can't see it lol Great Video especially the glass cleaning one! Thanks for posting all its uses!

you can wet it, mold it into whatever shape you want, and it'll set and be strong and waterproof. like clay that doesn't need to be fired. it's basically a form of plaster. you can also reclaim it by firing it and making something new in the same manner. you can add in animal bones to the fire, as well, to get higher quality plaster. this makes a nice material for making molds to cast metal parts, as it's easier to get together than sand casting, captures finer details and will set up to a solid shape that you can work with tools but won't just crumble on you if you so much as bump it the wrong way. and generally the heat from casting makes reclaiming it for another project very simple, with maybe just some chunks far away from the high heat of the molten metal not being converted back into an anhydrous material.

Thank you HomeSteadHow I have a back yard with a firepit and I never even knew I could do so much from using the ashes.

Really enjoyed your video, as we have plenty of wood ash. It works great on rose plants. All these ideas are GREAT, when you can save money.

I’ve been cleaning the glass in the log burner with ash for the last 15 years. It was in the instructions and works very well. Just get a damp J cloth, dab it in the ash and rub round the glass. Then find a clean bit of J cloth and wipe it off. Chuck away the J cloth at the end (just old ones that were used for other things first).

A lot of the uses in this video are based on the same group of characteristics. Wood ash has a relatively large proportion of silicon crystals (at the microscopic level) that allows it to work as an abrasive at a very fine level. The same crystals make it very hard on insects by cutting them up like diatomaceous earth. These crystals are also a pozzolan that can be added to concrete to change its behavior, or used on their own as a weak cement. Wood ash also contains a significant amount of potassium hydroxide, which has a lot of uses. Potassium hydroxide is a relative of lye (sodium hydroxide) that is nearly identical in usage. You can make soap with it, in fact you can make soap with your skin oils instantly just by wetting your hands and rubbing some wood ash on them, after a few seconds add more water and rub your hands. This is also a step in making potassium nitrate with its own host of uses, like black powder.

*@HomeSteadHow* 5:40 You can also use a regular newspaper (not plastic paper), rip out a page, roll it up so you can grip it nicely, dip it first in water, then dip it in the ash, then rub that window as usual. When done you can just burn the paper, it saves on cleaning those rags.

Gr8 vid!!!! Learning new things 2 keep in my back pocket evry day 🙂🗯