Are all wood chips safe for a chicken run?

[DavidReaves]

Keep your pine shavings below 140C (284F), don't aerosolize them chemically or by planing them and don't worry about it.

Or use something else. It will have some sort of risk too. But you might feel better about it because you are avoiding this minuscule risk.

I clipped out all the cites you gave from the quote, which, unlike the author on the "Featherbrain" blog gave some information about the research rather than the blog post which made an assertion, then a reference-- but did not actually cite the reference or give ACTUAL information from the reference. Your snippets of information confirmed that the supposed references were likely used to give her credibility, but actually didn't support her assertions. I did read the blog post but didn't find it convincing. Thank you for actually checking some of the references, since it saved me some time.

Finally, I will be surprised if any of the hens I keep make it past 7 years. I admit, chickens are somewhat for entertainment, but more so for education (for my granddaughter) and eggs. When the hens stop producing eggs, culling the old and integrating new hens are part of the educational process.

 

[Silexian]

I would use mulch in a run. The bigger pieces will last longer and do a better job of keeping your fowl up out of the mud. Than shavings will. I buy mulch from a local sawmill. All hardwood, no coloring or insecticides added. The best thing is the price! A scoop that piles the full length of my 12 ft. X 7 ft. utility trailer. About 3 ft. high. Is $35!

 

[BarronVon]

If they were actually toxic the commercial farmers wouldn't be using them and stores wouldn't sell them for fear of lawsuits.

Don't be tricked by scaremongers.

Right, the commercial farmers for sure put the chickens first, which is why the average lifespan is 5 for commercial chickens. Most commercial farmers use metal "bedding" or straw anyways. Also, if I had a nickel for every time stores have sold something dangerous for animals id have thousands of nickels (As both a dog and chicken person). Writing off the literal HUNDEREDS of studies done on different bedding and their effects as people trying to sell you things is pretty messed up, seeing all the effort scientists have put into experimenting. Stop following the crowd, just because a lot of people do or use it, doesn't mean it's safe or right.

 

[3KillerBs]

Once again, I highly recommend people research, instead of taking the word of other's blindly.

Or look at the real world rather than scaremongering over tiny, theoretical risks.

 

[raingarden]

Galvanizing is many orders of magnitude more toxic than pine or cedar. Are you going to stop using hardware cloth and chicken wire too?

 

[saysfaa]

....

And again I have lost interest in followingvthe research further.

...

Maybe I'll go a little further
Next.
She says "The chemicals responsible for causing liver stress and damage in animals are most likely the terpene hydrocarbons and aromatic compounds in pine (Miyamoto et al., 2008; Li et al., 2009).

https://www.researchgate.net/public...ve_and_recycle_bedding_for_laboratory_animals

"...We developed a ground-breaking system to improve fresh bedding and recycle used bedding by applying a soft hydrothermal process with high-temperature and high-pressure dry steam....

The purpose of the present study was to evaluate the chemical and physical properties of the [bedding]...

we have been maintaining mice for several months and analysing their growth and blood components. So far, the data have indicated few differ-
ences except for a suppression in the induction of P-450, a microsomal enzyme in liver, when compared with animals
maintained using fresh bedding (data will
be presented elsewhere)."

Soooooo.... that source doesn't focus on the effects of terpene hydrocarbons and aromatic compounds on liver stress and damage? But might give a few threads to pull - "suppression in the induction of P-450, a microsomal enzyme in liver,"

"P-450, a microsomal enzyme in the liver"

I don't know what that is. So... https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cytochrome_P450

Short version -

"CYP enzymes have been identified in all kingdoms of life: animals, plants, fungi, protists, bacteria, and archaea, as well as in viruses. ...[In humans] Cytochrome P450 enzymes are present in most tissues of the body, and play important roles in hormone synthesis and breakdown (including estrogen and testosterone synthesis and metabolism), cholesterol synthesis, and vitamin D metabolism. Cytochrome P450 enzymes also function to metabolize potentially toxic compounds, including drugs and products of endogenous metabolism such as bilirubin, principally in the liver....

CYPs are the major enzymes involved in drug metabolism, accounting for about 75% of the total metabolism.[23] Most drugs undergo deactivation by CYPs, either directly or by facilitated excretion from the body. Also, many substances are bioactivated by CYPs to form their active compounds like the antiplatelet drugclopidogrel and the opiate codeine...."

The liver seems to be processing. That isn't damage. The liver is supposed to process all kinds of things produced by the body and from outside the body.

The other threads to pull are the studies this author references. But first, Li.

 

[saysfaa]

Li et al., 2009
https://tohoku.pure.elsevier.com/en...ocessing-of-red-cedar-bedding-reduces-its-ind

"...We examined the effect of essential oil of red cedar (EORC), as well as the effect of bedding from which it had been removed, on [levels of P450s] in mice. EORC was obtained from liquid extracts of red cedar bedding by a soft-hydrothermal process and was administered orally to mice...

In particular, several volatile sesquiterpenes, naphthalene-derived aromatics and 4,4-dimethyl- 13α-androst-5-ene were decrease..."

I think this study might be relevant to what she is saying. If the chemicals are the same in pine as they are in red cedar and this study includes how much of these chemicals are in cedar... it tells us something if we can find how much is in pine.

My chemistry isn't good enough to tell if the two studies are talking about the same substances.

 

[3KillerBs]

The chickens don't live long enough to see the effects, pine shaving don't directly kill a chicken, but it can in other ways, by causing cancer in the lungs, impacting the digestive system and causing crop impactions, and cell damage. How about instead of trying to hold up this myth, you actually research it.

Yeah. Right.

Yet valuable racehorses worth millions of dollars are kept on pine.

 

[BarronVon]

Yeah. Right.

Yet valuable racehorses worth millions of dollars are kept on pine.

Is this the ONLY thing you have to say? You have nothing to back it up unless it's "Well this person and these people use it, so it must be fine" As someone who is in the horse industry, once again, most aren't in pine shaving enough, or are adopted out and sent to retirement before the pine takes visible effect, and even then, sometimes longer careered horses end up having lung problems. Please back up your claims with science and stop acting like a child always needing to be right.

 

[BarronVon]

Aging animals are always subject to the diseases of senescence.

Why would I be keeping aging chickens who don't lay productively if at all and who are naturally prone to increasing health problems regardless of their management?



That is, expensive bedding that may only be locally available or available in limited quantities.

If the million-dollar racehorses can live on pine the $5 chickens can live on pine.

There's so much to unpack here... I don't even know where to start.... Therefore, if you genuinely believe you in are the right, have at it, but please don't recommend pine to people. I also recommend in about a half hour, to come back to this thread, and read the science, then you'll be cooled off and out of your "I need to be right" childish additude. Please do look into the studdies, and realize just because something is against your beliefs, doesn't mean it's wrong or "scaremongering". I'm done here.