Bedding hacks

[Driley62]

What does everyone use for bedding to save?

I've heard sand, pine shavings, hay, dried leaves and shredded newspapers.

Looking for everyone to put in their backs to help everyone save some time and a few bucks as we creep closer to the winter months!

 

[DobieLover]

What does everyone use for bedding to save?

I've heard sand, pine shavings, hay, dried leaves and shredded newspapers.

Looking for everyone to put in their backs to help everyone save some time and a few bucks as we creep closer to the winter months!

I use poop boards and scoop them every morning. This keeps the bedding that I put in clean. I will add one more bag of bedding around mid-November but I only clean the coop out once a year so I save quite a lot in bedding... and spend it on Sweet PDZ instead. But the labor savings are tremendous.

 

[RoyalChick]

I use leaves. I pile them up in a corner of the yard and fill a couple of those big yard bags and drag them over and dump them in the coop, run, or both. I try to give them a couple of bags each week mainly because they have so much fun destroying the heap!
A big pile of leaves lasts me about a year and then more come from the trees so it is completely free. Towards the end of the year the bottom of the pile has rotted down but there are usually still plenty for bedding.
I use pine shavings and shredded packing paper in the nest boxes and I empty those out onto the floor as well sometimes.
I also use pine straw from a couple of white pines.
Then kitchen scraps get mixed in by the ladies and I toss in any tea bags, coffee grounds and coffee filters.
I haven’t had to clean out since I started a few years ago - but the level has got a bit high in one area so I am going to dig it out before winter and gift all that yummy organic stuff to my roses.
Works for me at least.

 

[saysfaa]

Autumn leaves, twigs, grass form the bagger when we mow lawn, wood stove pellets after they didn't work well for making maple syrup, grass hay, pine needles, pine shaving when I found them on sale, stalks and leaves from the vegetable garden, punky wood, bits of shredded paper and cardboard, sawdust and wood shavings and drill curls and wood chips from constructing the coop, bits if charcoal and ash from the wood and paper burned in the burn barrel, rye and oat straw, a few wasp nests.

It is up to about 5 inches deep now, after three months, on its way to the planned 10" or so. I add things as they come available. I don't think I would like any of them by themselves nearly as much as the mix.

I have a poop board too, with pdz and fine sand, to keep the easy half or so of the poop out of the bedding.

 

[saysfaa]

I use leaves. I pile them up in a corner of the yard and fill a couple of those big yard bags and drag them over and dump them in the coop, run, or both. I try to give them a couple of bags each week mainly because they have so much fun destroying the heap! ...

They do! I leave them in the bags sometimes, with the open the end open and the closed end ripped. They like to jump on them and to hunt in them. I assume for the creepy crawlies since I've seen them find some.

I wish I had a source of coffee grounds.

 

[RoyalChick]

They do! I leave them in the bags sometimes, with the open the end open and the closed end ripped. They like to jump on them and to hunt in them. I assume for the creepy crawlies since I've seen them find some.

I wish I had a source of coffee grounds.

You can often get them for free at Starbucks. They have a bin where they put them out in bags for gardeners. And if they don’t, you can ask the Starbucks manager if they would do it for you.
In the end I only did that a couple of times. I found dragging my own leaves over simpler ‘cos I didn’t have to get in the car and go to Starbucks!
Yup. You guessed it. I am a certain kinda lazy!

 

[WIchickMama]

Are people putting fresh grass clippings in? Or wait til the dry?

Also, with the shredded paper, in the coop or the run?


I use a mix of hemp, straw and pine shaving in the coop. Straw is mainly in the nesting boxes but sometimes I will throw a few handfuls on the floor. Coop is about 5-6 inches deep. Will take out a good chunk and add fresh before it get snowy here.

In the run, half is dirt so they can find grit (I do throw extra down sometimes) and half woodchips. Will add leaves this fall once they dry. (You might find an occasional corn cob mixed in too, lol)

 

[saysfaa]

I use fresh grass clippings but only a little at a time - basically, a thin layer over most of floor with a few clumps. They are too wet to use much more; I don't want mold. I pick the part of the lawn with the shortest grass so they can safely snack on it. The rest goes to mulch the garden oe sometimes on the compost pile.

I wouldn't spend the time to dry it for bedding but I've used a little that inadvertently dried where it was easy to gather.

 

[Iluveggers]

Does using piles of leaves bring “bad” bugs into the coop? I always worry about mites.

 

[RoyalChick]

Are people putting fresh grass clippings in? Or wait til the dry?

Also, with the shredded paper, in the coop or the run?


I use a mix of hemp, straw and pine shaving in the coop. Straw is mainly in the nesting boxes but sometimes I will throw a few handfuls on the floor. Coop is about 5-6 inches deep. Will take out a good chunk and add fresh before it get snowy here.

In the run, half is dirt so they can find grit (I do throw extra down sometimes) and half woodchips. Will add leaves this fall once they dry. (You might find an occasional corn cob mixed in too, lol)

I don't use grass clippings because I leave them in place to mulch the lawn. I use shredded paper in nest boxes and then dump it out on the floor of the coop every now and then or if it gets dirty. The ladies move things from coop to run with their scratching so I don't really have much say in where it ends up.
Sounds like you and I do similar. When I dig out before winter I will find some things that haven't broken down - mainly things like corn cobs, pumpkin stems, peach pits and pistachio shells.