I dont know I just saw that and was thinking about trying it My neighbor has a flock of 175, and puts ceder wood chips in twice a year and his are fine
The oils in cedar are toxic which should help eliminate pests in the nest. It's all a matter of amount. A small amount of cedar in the nest boxes will probably have little toxic affect upon the chickens.
Ya know,.. before I read on BYC that cedar was bad for chickens,. we used it a lot,. and never noticed a problem,.
Now we use pine,. because it costs less!
Well,. I believe it does deter them greatly ,.. but I also dust generously with DE and oil their legs with Neem oil,.. so I can't say it was just the cedar,..I use cedar in my dogs bed to keep away bugs,. and we've never had lice/mites.
I recently spoke on the phone to a customer service rep for the brand of pine bedding I use. He assured me that any information about cedar being toxic for chickens was a fallacy, most likely created on the internet. He extolled the natural bug fighting abilities of cedar bedding, and suggested to disregard any information that cedar bedding is toxic for chickens.