The toxins in yew needles/branches (including taxine, and derivatives from which the cancer drug taxol are made) are potent when directly ingested. I would anticipate that there would be very little problem with using the trimmings on the bottom layer of a lasagna bed, as these sorts of things tend to dissipate or be digested.

If worried- then avoid planting root crops there. With perrenials- it should be of no concern that I could imagine.

Reminds me that I still have a 90# yew war bow in the works that should be finished (especially if the French were to invade).

-pH

I chipped mine. But in a similar situation, I used large pieces from christmas trees and junipers as mulch around rhodos and other shrubs.

Of course, preparing for a repeat of the Battle of Agincourt like Pablo is doing is also a good use for the wood.

Naturally, I then googled "Yew toxic" - yikes! I hadn't realized quite how nasty that stuff is! Ironic, since I grew up with yew in front of my parents' house, and they only told us about the berries - which apparently are the *least* toxic part! Dd was pretending to feed the branches to giraffes - good thing they were imaginary giraffes!

I think the perennial bed is a good place for them - I think I'll be keeping them out of the veggie garden, just to be on the safe side!

But, Pablo, apparently you should also be making the arrows out of the yew - I found a reference (I forget which link now) that mentioned that poison arrows were made from yew.

Because the wood from Yews used to be used to make very dangerous weapons (long bows) should they be banned? Use the trimmings you have as part of a mulch or as part of a Lasagna (compost) pile on a planting bed. There is not a problem with that, even though a drug that is effective at fighting cancer can be extracted from Yews. It takes a lot of Yews to produce a very small amount of that drug.

My understanding is that the toxins have caused the death of livestock that have eaten the plant. As a soil layer- it's not going to be directly ingested, of course.

I do have one 60# yew longbow that I made maybe 6-7 years ago that shoots like a dream. Of all the bows I made- it may have shot the best, but the wood is so soft that the bow got marred carrying it in the woods.

When I was making that first bow- the dust from sanding caused breathing problems. Few woods do that to me- none of the whitewoods, not osage (though it gave me contact dermatitis when it stuck to me in the summer)... only certain tropicals. Ipe (known by many names- sometimes used as decking material) was worse than yew.

I composted the shavings and sawdust from all of these woods without problem. Black walnut shavings are known to be poisonous to some livestock, I am also told.

Yup, what he said. The references I found mainly talked about the effect of yew on animals, mainly grazing animals like cattle, goats, horses etc. Apparently dogs & cats hardly ever try to eat yew. And I'm assuming squirrels don't, considering how many we have around our house!

My other concern, aside from toxicity, is how well the branches work in a lasagna bed without being chipped. Should I try to chop them into little pieces to help the whole decomposition process along? That's the other reason I figure they should go near the bottom, since it will take them longer to decompose than other things - I'm hoping by the time roots extend that deep, they will have decomposed!

I understand that livestock can't eat them, but the deer have feasted on ours all Winter long so I'm guessing it's OK for some animals. We had a sheep once that munched on them as well

I realized reading this that I have never had berries on any of my yews. Is there a universal male I could get to enable this?