brooder bedding

[City Farmer Jim]

I agree with most suggestions here ...PDZ and wood shavings. I have learned by experience the first thing I do with chics is try to suspend the food so they have to tippy toe or a small riser to eat it and nippler water system. They help keep the feed clean and in the feeder, the chics figure out a nipple very fast and that keeps the brooder dry. Just my opinion and what works best for me.

 

[Conan]

I use old towels, and old bath mats. I have tons of them, and they just so happen to fit the bottom of a trough (my brooders) perfectly. With chicks, I change out as often as necessary. With ducklings, I change daily. Once I move the brooders outdoors, I swap to pine chips.

 

[Conan]

I use old towels cut to small, shake out poop and food on lawn reuse till it is time (usually 2 days) to rinse, wash and reuse- like cloth diapers on a painted floor that I can scrape. I hate one use plastic anything, like the puppy pads and lessen my carbon footprint by NOT buying shavings, as cool as they are. One less thing to ship.View attachment 2169392

A fellow towel user!

 

[TropicalBabies]

A fellow towel user!

Yeah, after us and dog and cat and car... and whatever else.., they can become chicken towels no prob. Love it.

 

[Willow2253]

I use wood horse bedding pellets. Pretty much the same advantages as wood shavings, but more absorbent. I've never had a problem with chicks eating it.

 

[Boccom]

I like broody hens since they look funny with their feathers puffed out

 

[Padmewasmurdered]

I’ve only raised 3 chicks so far but we used pine shavings after about 3 days of paper towel. I also changed it everyday. It was only like $6 for a big bag of it at the feed store. Went thru just one & 1/2 bags thru the six weeks we had them inside. Just make sure it’s the good shavings & not sawdust. Once they get about a week old u can put things under the feeder/waterer to elevate it so they can’t kick bedding in their food/water. We used some landscaping bricks. We used a very large storage bin with a baby gate as the lid. Popped them in another bin while I cleaned their “brooder”.

 

[Rose Quartz]

So I've been searching the threads and I can't seem to find a definitive answer to brooder bedding. I know it is mostly personal preference, but I like clarity. I have a friend who only uses newspaper in her brooders (but then I read it's too slippery), I google bedding and read that someone else uses plastic shelf liner and paper towel (paper towel is like gold right now, along with TP so I don't want to waste what stock I have and I don;t have shelf liner), more people on google seem to use sand (I research and find that most sand has silica, which is a carcinogen, so i dont want to use that). HELP.
Someone please lay it out for me lol. I read people like shavings/wood chips but that they are a pain to clean. I want/need something easy and simple to clean and use.

Uhhh, maybe not easy to clean per se, but peat moss is what i use. As long as it doesn't get wet, it doesn't smell. Completely keeps the chicks in my house from stinking.

However it is excessively dusty, so you might not want it in your house.

 

[Arianna Rose]

I use wood shaving and they work great it just depends on the brooder you have them in and normally if one of my broody hen hatches a batch of chicks i don't put them in brooder unless it's winter because they have their mom. Unless you bought chicks from someone then you definitely need a brooder so I would say wood shavings.

 

[jeanette bettis]

I am really new to chick raising. I have 2 bathrooms,so I am using 1 tub for 2 wk old babies . I use the adult bedpads, they are larger than the puppy pads and then a grass from the pet store. It is for birds but it is like semi dry grass. It is called Randy Grass. Kinda straw like and fairly inexpensive. Had a friend tell me he lost a group of babies using wood chips and suggested do not use babies died maybe from eating wood chips