New chickens and sneezing.

[appps]

Mine have always sneezed yet our first lot of bantams never did so I do think some are just more succeptible to dust etc.

What sort of bedding are they on? Ours were quite bad when I first got them and we had them in a small box coop at night on wood shavings (for guinea pigs) while in quarantine. They got bad enough to worry me but then improved when I took out the shavings.

 

[graybeard]

They are on pine shavings inside the coop. What else can I use for bedding that's safe?

 

[Lady of McCamley]

They are on pine shavings inside the coop. What else can I use for bedding that's safe?

I've used straw. It is cheap and works well and is easy to clean out of the coop. It also makes a very cushy bed for eggs (if you get a finer cut than straight stubble) and keeps the hens warm in winter. However, I've found it doesn't decompose well, which is a pain in the compost and anywhere it spills. The run was terrible to shovel out. You also can get quite a few seed heads (which the chickens love) but can contribute to weeds.

Timothy hay is better to decompose, being softer and finer, but it's more expensive, and you get grass seeds there too which can cause weed growth.

I've used Noah's Choice Animal Bedding which works pretty good, but it is expensive and the pellet disintegrates into sawdust when wet and almost turns into cement with the fine particles at the bottom. It can be a pain to get out of a coop.

It could be these 2 birds are especially sensitive to pine shavings, however your other birds have been doing fine and it only comes on with weather change. I would think a pine shaving sensitivity would be present until the shavings go away, not go away with cool and moist weather. Coming on and off with weather change in just those 2 birds makes me suspicion CRD.

I do use the kiln dried larger chip pine shavings, and prefer that over the fine chip which is more like sawdust. I was worried at first about using pine shavings, but I had so many long time chicken keepers swear by the pine shavings; so I started using it because of my complaints with the other bedding mentioned above. I've have never had a problem. But I know a lot of people dislike pine shavings for animal, in particular young chicks, due to the possible pine vapors.

My experiences
Lady of McCamley

 

[graybeard]

I've been payin a lot of attention to them today and its my White rock in particular. The Cinnamon queen is doing a lot better today. I guess I need to get to work on gettin the rooster booster.