Nesting Box bedding... straw or hay?

[Guinea Goonie]

Quote:
I agree, hay is really cheap. A nice grass hay bail will do you for months and if you keep it dry it will last up to a year easy.

Some use alfalfa, I tend not to. Even though the chickens like the leafs; and for sure they do; they tend to get impacted

sometimes. If the ladies break an egg in the nest boxes, I just remove this and put a fresh handful in.

The other day I had two hens on the same nest they had made out of the grass hay bail I have in the horse barn.

Every day they cluck on over there and lay; do their deed. It is private, warm and dry in the hay pile. If I put hay in a

feed bag they tend to make a nest in this and lay. Really they just like the grass hay.

 

[Tala]

I use pine pellets - dampened and fluffed into sawdust. Feels nice and springy to walk on in the coop floor, and they've never broken an egg. Pellets are pretty cheap too, and we already buy them, so I just keep it simple.

 

[chickens again]

I use shredded paper in my nest boxes: it's free (I have a small shredder) and the chickens don't eat it - about the only thing they DON'T eat! My girls don't poop in the boxes so it stays clean. Some sticks to the eggs when they are first laid, and damp, but it just peels right off.

 

[Chicken Downunder]

I've just switched to pine shavings as I heard that hay and especially straw has more chance of habouring little pestie beasties ie mites etc. I like the idea of sredded paper so I'm going to try that as well

 

[Ariel301]

The shredded paper does sound like a good idea! Whenever we empty our shredder I keep thinking there's got to be a good use for all that paper...I can't bed the goats with it because they just eat it. I'll try throwing it in the nest boxes.

 

[Keri78]

I have tractors with attached hutches for them to roost in(and someday soon hopefully lay eggs in) Anyway, I always use hay b/c it does give them something to peck at and it helps with bordom on those long cold wet days when no one gets a chance to get out! I used shavings in their runs b/c they are muddy now b/c we had so much rain but within a month the shavings have turned to mush too! So I just added alot of nice fluffy hay to cover their runs and hope that this will keep everyone busy scratching through it and also keep their feet dry. Here in NJ hay and straw is almost the same price per bale and I love the smell of fresh hay and giving them a snack! Blessings, Keri

 

[McCord6]

I was going to be using pine shavings. Really cheap. You can get a big block of it at Walmart for less then $8.

 

[mom2jedi]

Quote:
I use shavings in my coop and don't have the run built yet. When we do build it, I'm planning to give it a good layer of sand. It's supposed to help with drainage issues and while we don't have much (if any) rain here when it does rain it can flood since the ground is so hard. Have you thought of putting in sand instead of the shavings? At least for your runs? It should help with the drainage issues you're having hopefully. I was at Home Depot and bags of all purpose sand was $2.25 for a 50#bag. They even had a chart to figure out how many bags you'd need based on your sq ft requirements. For 4" deep, for a 50 sq ft area it would take 9 bags... so fairly inexpensive. Much cheaper than play sand which was twice as much.

Hope this helps!

My Wal-Mart carries shavings too for around $8, but my local feed stores have bigger bales for the same price so I get it there instead.

 

[thatchickenlady]

Hay is cheapest here and works best for me, although I've used some of the others. Clean and replaced when necessary to avoid mold build-up and parasite infestations...

 

[yayachicken]

I've used coastal grass for the past two years....it's what's available here in Texas. But I read somewhere on here that straw is better. Anyway, coastal grass prices went way up with the drought last year and i've switched to straw which is cheaper. The girls don't seem to mind which one is used. I line the boxes with newspaper, that way, I just pick up the whole package to change out the bedding...faster and easier.