Hi,
My wife....who knows all there is to know about everything says......
its fine to put the shavings on the compost provided its mixed with green stuff and grass cuttings. All the green stuff is full of nitrogen and lacks carbon so the woodshavings add the carbon element and will make the compost rot down quickly. If you put wood shavings down on the garden as a mulch directly, it will, over probably two years cause nitrogen depletion.
Give it to the chickens as bedding and allow them to 'do their stuff' on it will enable the manure to rot down very quickly. We use about four tons every year without problems.
We have a lot of chickens for meat and eggs. My wife runs a plant nursery business and we also are completely self sufficient in fruit and vegetables. So the plot is productive and my contribution together with the chicken's saves a fortune in fertiliser. Having said that, we do add a little bit of nitrogen around the fruit trees from time to time just to be safe.
Basically, I sort the shavings with a sieve. Takes me about half an hour every week. There is usually quite a big pile at one side of the workshop. I suppose I should do it every day but I'm a lazy git and there is important stuff to do like posting on forums and playing games on the Mac.
The big stuff goes to the chickens
The first sieve goes on the compost
The crud left on the floor either goes on the paths or directly to the dump with the other rubbish.
