wood shavings v newspaper

Sue

Sue

New member
Joined
Jan 11, 2011
Messages
789
Reaction score
0
Location
South West
I have been using dust extracted wood shavings in both my houses for 12 months now. A few weeks ago I decided that I needed to cut down on the dust in the wooden house (I have one wooden and one plastic) because the hens in this house have had the problems with Myco and IB and therefore have been wheezy and the dust must have been making this worse for them. I decided to replace the shavings in the house with thick layers of newspaper and just put the shavings in the 2 nest boxes. This has definitely cut down on the dust and is also much easier to keep the house clean. I remove the soiled newspaper every morning and replace with new layers as required and then once a week remove all the paper and brush out the house and wipe down the walls with warm water with tea tree oil in it. This keeps the house more or less dust free and smelling fresh. The only problem I have with this method is disposing of the soiled paper! I used to put the soiled shavings into my brown recycling bin, but can't put the newspaper in it. As I don't have a compost heap I have to dispose of the paper in the black bags (household waste) at the moment as I don't know how else to dispose of it. But it does cut down on the cleaning out times every week and I have now decided to use it in my Green Frog house as well. It is obviously also cheaper as I don't use anything like the amount of shavings I did before. I don't know whether this would cut down on mites/lice etc., but it must mean they have less places to hide. It's quite surprising how much dust the 'dust extracted' shavings was obviously causing!

Just thought I'd share my experience of this in case anyone was interested in the comparison between the two systems.
 
As you know Sue, I use newspaper as well, and find it's very convenient and effective. I just wrap up the solid poos in the top layer or two of paper, put this on the compost heap (the paper wrapping decomposes and helps dilute the strong droppings) and then the folded wodge of clean but damp paper layers below just goes in the recycling bin. The top layer with the poo on just acts as a filter, leaving harmless non-smelly damp underneath, and since the paper for recycling doesn't have to be dry and is stored in huge bales out in the open until re-used, this seems quite acceptable to me.
However, an alternative you might like to know about is Smartbedz, see the thread about it here http://poultrykeeperforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=5905&p=33420&hilit=smartbedz#p33420 I've been trying this out in the quail house and ui'm very impressed. Quail are smelly birds because they have a high-protein diet which adds extra ammonia to the droppings, and after aboiut 3 days on shavings a cageful of them was really starting to pong. Also as you say the shavings went everywhere and were quite dusty. So i got some Smartbedz and amazingly, the problem seems to be solved - what it says on the website about absorbency and odour control is perfectly accurate. The dust-free straw pellets break down and can be composted or used as mulch, much better than shavings which take ages to decompose. Also I took advantage of their offer, introduced it to my local pet shop which have agreed to stock it, so now I qualify for a full refund on my initial online order of two large bags.
So i shall go on with newspaper in the chicken coop, but thought you might like to consider this as an alternative.
 
We don't have newspapers -too expensive. The free ones don't get delivered here either. But it sounds like a good idea as long as they don't eat the print, which I think some of ours would.
 
Yes, Marigold, I did know this was your method. It is interesting to hear your experience of the Smartbedz, but we don't have any pet shops apart from Pets at Home so unless they start stocking it I would have to pay for carriage. But this would cut down on the dust even more if I used this in the nest boxes. I have obviously been having a 'senior moment' regarding the newspaper, because it is quite obvious NOW that I only need to dispose of the top sheet with the poos in somewhere else and I can put the rest of the damp paper in the recycling box (why didn't I think of that!!!!!!!)

Chris, mine haven't shown any interest in the newspaper at all. Mind you, they may not approve of the one I have and would prefer The Guardian or The Times!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
mine just seem to use the paper as carpet, en route to the nestboxes, or as something to walk on briefly when about to hop up to the perches at night. Nobody has shown any interest in eating it!
I agree about supply - but as we have the Guardian every day, and it seems to be made to fit the Green Frog very neatly, (or vice versa!) using it in the coop makes for a sort of double recycling.
 
Sue said:
It is interesting to hear your experience of the Smartbedz, but we don't have any pet shops apart from Pets at Home so unless they start stocking it I would have to pay for carriage. )

quote

actually it was our local small independent garage that I got to stock it, along with the other sundries he carries to meet the needs of a small town with few shops. I just said pet shop for simplicity in my post!
Click to expand...
 
I will put this in a separate post as well, but thought this may be of interest. I have just found a website who is selling the Smartbedz in 10kg bags for £11.95 (3 pence per bag cheaper than Smartbedz themselves) and they have a special offer of 'buy one get one free' and if that wasn't a good enough offer they also have free carriage if you spend over £29. Normal carriage is only £4.95 if order is under £29 whereas Smartbedz carriage is £6.50. So if anyone is thinking of trying this bedding this would be a good opportunity.

http://www.kennelgate.co.uk/item/Smartbedz/SmartBedz-Universal-Pet-Bedding-and-Litter-5kg-to-10kg/9KJ

I've just placed an order Marigold, so I'll see how we get on with it.
 
i am tempted to go back to paper for the summer but i have just brought a large bale of shavings but i would have to ask people for newspapers as my dad has to re read the sun which i get everyday and it can take him weeks to read just one paper its the same with the free papers , i can get massive sheets of paper from work that i have used before { girls nearly had heartattack when they first saw it and walked on it } and this stuff is ideal as its 4ft by 4ft sheets but i am sure theres something on it as its very very flammable we use it to start our fires with dont know wether to go back to paper or not i can probably get large sheets of normal paper as well .
 
karminski, you could always ask around your neighbours our work colleagues, friends etc. and get them to save theirs for you if they don't need them themselves. That's what I do.
 
already done it with 3 neighbours :lol: also if you brush the worse of the poo up then you shouldnt need to take paper out each day unless it was really soggy which is better and with only putting shavings in the nest boxes then thats even cheaper on bedding unless you want to use shredded newpapers :-)05but i will say that i have even found mites tuked into the shavings before and that makes it really hard to see them .
 
I'm afraid I'm much too fussy to leave even one sheet of paper in that may be slightly damp!!! Only completely dry paper stays in and new sheets added as necessary. As I've said, I've sent for some of the Smartbedz to use instead of the shavings to cut down even more on dust. I think that may work out cheaper anyway, especially if I can find special offers like the one I posted about. Maybe with the Smartbedz I won't need to completely clean out the nest boxes every week like I do with the shavings as I remove any soiled areas daily anyway. How often do you find you need to clean out with the Smartbedz Marigold?
 
i haven't used it for chickens as I think shavings are comfortable in the nestboxes and they don't get dirty or wet because nobody sleeps in there, and in fact I seldom change them, just top them up now and then with more shavings and redmite powder. And as I said I use paper on the coop floor. However, in the quail cages the straw pellets do last much longer than shavings - I have one cage with 7 quail, now 6 weeks old in ATM so nearly adult. I shall split them into two cages once I can sex them in a week or two, but at present, on shavings, they would get very smelly after 3 - 4 days whereas on Smartbedz so far they've been OK and don't smell after 6 days so i may be able to go to 10 days between cleanouts. If so, the Smartbedz will work out cheaper or about the same price as shavings, and much less messy in terms of bits of shavings getting everywhere including all over my fleece jacket! You can't poo pick quail cages, as they do little poos all over the place and it gets mixed in with the bedding as they're always scurrying around, hence what you smell is what you get! However it seems to dry out in contact with the straw pellets and I think this helps the odour control.
 
I have just scrubed the chicken cop and replaced hempcore with smartbeds.I was surprised that pellets are big so poo picking may be a bit tricky from now on.On my small cop I had to use full 10kg bag + a bit more from the second.No dust whatsoever.Will be interesting reaction of my chickens when they see this stuff :o Most important there is no dust.I had left my nestboxes as they were before,otherwise my hens would go on stike :D
 
:lol: i tried paper it lasted one night :lol: to many girls in one house for it to be suitable had to take out pretty much the whole lot this morning so back on shavings again will get aubroise next week though as we have a delievery in at the yard .
 
We've used hay in the nestboxes so far. But the ewe has moved out and the hay is very dusty and full of mouse droppings. So we will try to find some newspaper and put wood shavings on top. Don't think they will like it at all though as they spend ages weaving the hay into a nest shape and have been using it for years. Is there anything artificial that they will be able to weave available? I won't use paper shavings/ shreddings as they are very sharp.
 
Still using newspaper inside the yungsters cop as they producing lots of poo and changing this each day.They have a bit wodshawings in the nest box where they sleep but it looks like they trow this out before seteling down and eventually sleep on the paper.Maybe they try to read bedtime story :mrgreen:
 
Pine shavings work great, but not for the first two weeks. I have lost several nice chicks to choking on pine shavings. I recommend using shredded newspaper the first two weeks, then using pine shavings once the chicks have developed enough to know not to swallow the shavings or can dislodge the shavings from their mouths.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Back
Top