# Need suggestions for disposing of cremains **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 8, 2018, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805 "2018-12-08T17:16:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2018, 7:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805/21 "2018-12-09T07:10:46Z")
A coffee can and a windy day always make for an entertaining disposal. Especially if someone is downwind from you. ---
**Author:** ![HoneyBadgerDC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/honeybadgerdc/32/1033_2.png) [@HoneyBadgerDC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HoneyBadgerDC)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2018, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805/22 "2018-12-09T14:46:23Z")
I see nothing wrong with putting them in the woods, sounds kind of nice to me. ---
**Author:** ![chappachula](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/d2c977/32.png) [@chappachula](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chappachula)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2018, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805/23 "2018-12-09T15:52:03Z")
> [@Licentious\_Ectomorph](#): > > how to get rid of them\*\* tastefully and respectfully.\*\* > mother has a living sister, my brother David had close friends in Austin, and my nephew might like to have his father’s remains. You may have no contact with these people now, but maybe sometime in the future you’ll see them again. Your estranged(?) nephew might not actually want to take possession of his father’s urn, but he might well want to ask you where it is, who took care of it, etc. Do you want to have to tell him that you just dumped it someplace unknown? If you want to keep things tasteful and respectful, pay the one-time fee for columbarium. It may hurt your budget for a month or two, but you’ll sleep better for years afterwards knowing you did the right thing. ---
**Author:** ![racer72](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/racer72/32/3075_2.png) [@racer72](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/racer72)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2018, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805/24 "2018-12-09T16:29:34Z")
Just remembered my then Mother in Law. Her ashes were tossed into Puget Sound from the back of a Washington State ferry. Found out it’s not legal after the fact. ---
**Author:** ![elbows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b3f665/32.png) [@elbows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elbows)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2018, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805/25 "2018-12-09T16:44:23Z")
I recently read of someone who waited a few years to dispose of cremations, and having finally settled on a spot discovered the cremains had, over time, transformed into a hard, solid brick. This took ‘spreading or sprinkling’, out of the equation and left them with lobbing a solid chunk like a football. Alternatively, chipping pieces off to distribute. Neither very attractive choices. At this stage, burying would seem the only dignified choice somehow. (Several persons reading the conversation were struck to check their urn only to discover the same state of affairs!) ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2018, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805/26 "2018-12-09T17:15:39Z")
I recall a story someone told on _Johnny Carson_ about how he owned a cabin cruiser and been asked by a friend of his to use it to scatter the cremains of a member of the fraternal organization the friend belonged to (Shriners I think). The deceased was the practical joker of the group and after the story-teller took the boat about five miles off shore and cut the engine, the solemn group of comrades opened the container and started to pour out the contents – just as the breeze switched directions and blew hard. After standing frozen for a moment with the ashes all over them, one of the group finally cracked, “Well, that’s Fred for ya.” When I die, I want to be cremated and my ashes left in the [Temple](https://www.cnn.com/2018/01/30/world/gallery/burning-man-temples/index.html) at Burning Man. It will burn on Sunday evening and then the ashes (and decomposed granite laid down to protect the playa surface) will be carted away as the city is taken down. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2018, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805/27 "2018-12-09T17:22:52Z")
> [@DesertDog](#): > > just as the breeze switched directions and blew hard. My mom worked at Gibbs Flying Service in San Diego. She went up on an aerial burial flight once. The guy dumping the ashes opened the window (I think it was a Cessna 172) and the slipstream blew the ashes back into the airplane. Also, he lost his brand-new Ray Bans. ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2018, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805/28 "2018-12-09T17:27:35Z")
^ As long as we’re using “cremains,” why not aerial + burial = baerial? ---
**Author:** ![skyr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/54ee81/32.png) [@skyr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/skyr)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2018, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805/29 "2018-12-09T17:33:14Z")
> [@Licentious\_Ectomorph](#): > > I thought about tracking down some of the people they were close to and asking if they’d like to have the urns. My mother has a living sister, my brother David had close friends in Austin, and my nephew might like to have his father’s remains. My fiance said that would be a strange thing to contact people about out of the blue, and I suppose he has a point. . I can’t imagine a scenario where I would rather not be asked for input about how to dispose of the remains of someone I cared about. ASK THEM. If it turns out they don’t care, they can say no and forget about it, but there’s a chance it might mean a lot more to them to have the remains than it does to you. ---
**Author:** ![Aspenglow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspenglow/32/76_2.png) [@Aspenglow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspenglow)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2018, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805/30 "2018-12-09T18:14:48Z")
I can offer a much less reverent solution. A friend of mine found himself in much the same situation as the OP, cremains of a family member he didn’t quite know how to dispose of. While he pondered the question, he shoved the box under a bed. Many years later, once he finally decided he would scatter the ashes over the ocean, he discovered with a shock that the box was nearly empty. Years of vacuuming under the bed had solved all his worries. ---
**Author:** ![lingyi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/d2c977/32.png) [@lingyi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lingyi)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2018, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805/31 "2018-12-09T20:27:28Z")
At the mortuary I worked at, we always placed the cremains in a plastic bag, never directly in the urn. If people wanted to do that themselves, that was their choice. Also, I use the term cremains for two reasons. First, having worked at a mortuary, it’s not only what I was taught to say, but I find it more respectful. Second, it describes what it is far better than “ashes”. As I stated above while there is some ash, most of what remains after the cremation process is is very brittle bones, some fully complete. They must be crushed or ground to make the smaller/finer particles that are referred to as “ashes”. ---
**Author:** ![Aspenglow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspenglow/32/76_2.png) [@Aspenglow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspenglow)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2018, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805/32 "2018-12-09T20:41:13Z")
> [@lingyi](#): > > At the mortuary I worked at, we always placed the cremains in a plastic bag, never directly in the urn. If people wanted to do that themselves, that was their choice. > > \ That’s how my husband’s cremains came to me: In a plastic bag in a box. I was left to decide how to place them in the urn I selected – with or without plastic. With respect to my friend who vacuumed up his loved one’s cremains over those many years, I didn’t ask about the particulars but had no reason to doubt his representation. The recollection continued to unsettle him for a long time after. ---
**Author:** ![lingyi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/d2c977/32.png) [@lingyi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lingyi)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2018, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805/33 "2018-12-09T20:41:57Z")
This brings back sad memories, but the only remains I would refer to as ashes are those of miscarried fetuses and placenta. The remains are red ash because of the iron in the blood of the placenta. The first time I saw it,I was freaked out because there was so little there and it was dark red. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805/34 "2018-12-10T01:13:49Z")
This is one of the things that haunts me. My brother in law died five years ago and the urn is in my mother in laws house…when she dies, it and an urn of hers will move to our house. I don’t want them…and worse, I KNOW my kids won’t want them when we die. As disrespectful as a scatter somewhere they weren’t close to is. scattering them - or burying them - in an intentional spot is way better than my children chucking them in the trash in 30 more years. I think I have managed to convince my husband of this so that he will do a scatter (but thanks for the warning that we may have a brick to bury rather than a scatter at this point). ---
**Author:** ![Tapiotar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3be4f8/32.png) [@Tapiotar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tapiotar)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805/35 "2018-12-10T01:58:08Z")
I would say definitely ask the relatives…you don’t know…they might care very much. If they don’t, no harm done. Otherwise, the columbarium idea is quite tidy. The little rural cemetery where we will take my father’s cremains this coming summer has small, inexpensive plots specifically for cremains. We would scatter them on the family farm, but that will probably be sold out of the family soon, so, all of us talking about it together, thought that that wasn’t such a good idea after all. ---
**Author:** ![Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/marvin_the_martian/32/2898_2.png) [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marvin_the_Martian)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805/36 "2018-12-10T02:45:15Z")
We used [this company](http://www.seaservices.com/index.html) for scattering my mother-in-laws ashes at sea. While we arranged for a small number of family members to go out for the scattering, they also can arrange to have the ashes scattered at one of a number of different locations without any family present. Basically you mail them the ashes and a check, then they mail back a certificate with the date and location of the scattering. ---
**Author:** ![snowthx](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowthx/32/10660_2.png) [@snowthx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/snowthx)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 3:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805/37 "2018-12-10T03:35:12Z")
Yes, I would check with any living relatives first - it’s not the kind of decision you can redo no matter how you decide to dispose of them. If no response or not interested, then you can do what you wish. My dad decided when my mom died to spread her ashes along a shoreline near where they lived, so that is what we did. I was selected to spread her ashes - so I walked out into the calm water up to my knees and started pouring. It was a plastic bag, that had been placed in a temporary urn. The comment about there being larger pieces is accurate - I was unprepared for that (I was expecting light ash: fine and consistent). When my dad died 3 years later, I decided to take him to the same place and do the same thing, since that is the last place they were happy together. I see nothing wrong with an uncomplicated dispersal of cremains in the wild. For myself, I abhor the idea of my remains taking up space or real estate somewhere for eternity. I will leave instruction that I am to be dispersed somewhere remote and wild. ---
**Author:** ![Spiderman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spiderman/32/230_2.png) [@Spiderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiderman)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805/38 "2018-12-10T04:43:48Z")
> [@Johnny\_L.A](#): > > My mom worked at Gibbs Flying Service in San Diego. She went up on an aerial burial flight once. The guy dumping the ashes opened the window (I think it was a Cessna 172) and the slipstream blew the ashes back into the airplane. Also, he lost his brand-new Ray Bans. Wouldn’t be the first case of them being scattered to the winds from a hot air balloon, where they **won’t** be blown back into the basket. Don’t know where in FL the OP is, but if interested & in the Orlando area, call [Kenny](http://www.balloonatic.com/contact.php). ---
**Author:** ![lingyi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/d2c977/32.png) [@lingyi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lingyi)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 6:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805/39 "2018-12-10T06:08:53Z")
Not that it’s likely anyone would get into real trouble for it, but the EPA requires cremains to be spread no closer than three nautical miles from shore and individual states may have Clean Water laws that restrict spreading them in rivers or streams. Dispersing in public areas may be subject to local laws also. I didn’t want to say anything out of respect, but burying an urn at a cemetery was very likely illegal. The purchase of the burial plot was almost certainly for the X square footage required for the burial of the casket. Anything beyond that is common area owned by the proprietors of the cemetery and not for private use. My maternal grandparents cremains are in a plot about 1’ X 2’ under a bronze plaque. I don’t consider the area surrounding the plaque to be part of the purchase agreement. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805/40 "2018-12-10T13:31:41Z")
If you do decide to contact the people who were close to them, I suggest that you first come up with a plan for disposing of the remains and inform them that on X date we are doing this with the remains. If you would rather have the remains for your own service please let us know before the deadline. If you don’t set a hard deadline, the other people are more likely to dither and you end up stuck with the remains and even less wiggle room to do something with them. Having come from a dysfunctional family myself, I am loath to get pulled back into their BS and I find setting firm parameters keeps it to a minimum. When my dog of 16 years died, my wife and I spread his remains in three separate locations, each important to us. When my dad died, I wrote a check to funeral home and got on with my life. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-suggestions-for-disposing-of-cremains/825805.md?page=3)