Coop bedding revisted

[RockyToggRanch]

Quote:
Woodpellets for the stove are the same? Exactly? Even safe if eaten? If that's the case, I know several places that have broken bags that they'd sell me cheap I'm going to have to research that.

I just bought 6 bags of pellets fromTSC and they're almost $7. a bag! I thought I'd try it in a one horse stall first.

 

[geareduplyn]

Quote:
Woodpellets for the stove are the same? Exactly? Even safe if eaten? If that's the case, I know several places that have broken bags that they'd sell me cheap I'm going to have to research that.

I just bought 6 bags of pellets fromTSC and they're almost $7. a bag! I thought I'd try it in a one horse stall first.

TSC has them on sale frequently. I try to buy a couple of pallets each time. They will not get stale.

 

[coberdor]

For the horse stall, be careful using the pellets for wood stoves. They may contain black walnut, which is deadly to horses. It's absorbed through the hooves. It must be pine only, or cedar.
I use the pellets in my stalls for the horses and in the coop. They work great. I use less of these, because once they break down, they are very finely ground and you only pick up the manure. They are super absorbent too!

 

[magsrags]

I've used the corn cob in brooder and really didn't like it. Never again, looks too much like their food as well.
Once damp it doesn't seem to dry fast at all. It gets "sticky" and my feather footed babies especially find it gunk up their toes bad.
hay didn't work for me either. Once wet it was a horror to clean up.

Shavings seem to be the way to go for me in the bed/coop area. Outside I now use playground sand on top of dirt packed in well.... and it is GREAT! Drains... absorbs the poop well after a good spraying down........they scratch at it and a little DE tossed on there now and again works wonders. My guys can free range for a each day so it works for me in the house keeping department.

 

[chookchick]

Tad, I use the wood chip too--I get tons of it free from the tree trimmers. I love it in the run and open area of the coop, it stays nice and clean and the chooks love to scratch in it. The poo just seems to disappear. I am nervous about using it in the sleeping area as the chips do seem to grow mold when they are moist (which is pretty much all year around here), so I use pine shavings. But if anyone uses chips in a smaller coop I would like to hear about that, and if they have any problems with mold. (No problems outside where they dig around it).

 

[Tad]

I have a 8 X 16 area with the nesting boxes and roosts in it thats tin roofed, so it stays dry in that area, we are very high humidity but with not a whole lot of rainfall to contend with so I am unfamilliar with the mold problem.

 

[Mac in Wisco]

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Were you using chopped straw or long straw? I don't think I've ever heard anybody recommend long straw for litter. Chopping it increases its absorption although it stills tends to cake unless you can entice the birds to stir it up by throwing some scratch on top.

The best litter performance wise has always been sawdust or shavings, but you have to weigh that against the expense. If you can find it locally, in bulk, at a reasonable cost, great. Some would scoff at the idea of buying something prepackaged that has probably been shipped across several states. Taking that into account the best may be what you can procure locally from sustainable resources. Grass clippings, sawdust from a local plant, straw (chopped in a mulcher / shredder), sand, dirt, etc.