Paper towel as bedding for brooder?

[sweetpea409]

I've seen people mention using paper towel as brooder bedding. Do you shred it or just lay it down?

 

[Chicks Galore3]

I layed it down on top of shavings, but never alone. Made it cushier, i guess.

 

[RonC]

The paper towels provide a little better footing for young chicks to prevent leg and foot problem till their bones harden. You don't want to use newspaper as it's too slick. Should be ok after a week or two and can just let them walk on the shavings then.

 

[a123andpoof]

I used them for my first hatch. I put shavings down first, but my chicks kept eating the shavings, so I put down the towels. Much easier to clean to.

 

[StephanieH]

Yup, don't shred or they will eat even more of it! I put mine over a couple of layers of newspaper, adding more a couple times a day. After the first week, I just add newspaper once or twice a day over the top. After 5 weeks, they have several inches of bedding that I'm excited to get into my compost pile! I was pleased with the lack of smell with this method as well.

 

[bj taylor]

puppy pads over shaving work well too.

 

[Vamvakas]

I didint like using paper towel cause it gets to moist and makes poop stick on chicks toes

 

[sweetpea409]

We have a lot of pine shavings, not purchased, just some we had, but they got wet, and they aren't going to dry in time for me to clean the brooder tomorrow. Rather than not clean it, I'm going to use paper towel I guess until the pine shavings dry out.

I should have thought to put some up in case it rained!

Sidenote question: I've been painstakingly picking out all of the sticks that fell into the pine shavings we have outside before putting them in the brooder with the chicks. The sticks are from our walnut tree, which sheds a lot, apparently. I'm thinking that I probably don't have to be so weird about picking them all out now that the chicks are a couple of weeks old, right?

 

[Chicks Galore3]

SweetPea409- My 2-week old chicks LOVE dragging sticks around the brooder.

 

[sweetpea409]

Awesome! That just made using my pine shavings a lot easier!