Using Shredded Paper for Coop Litter - As Good As Wood Chips?

[Sueby]

As far as I know, those plastic windows in the envelopes are not biodegradable. I was stating that it would be nice if they were biodegradable.

My reading comprehension is not what it used to be.

I also pick those stupid fruit stickers out of the compost constantly. I do remember reading about them being compostable too, but I assume it's just some brand or only in certain spots. Or they are as non degradable as the compostable veggie bags!

 

[gtaus]

My reading comprehension is not what it used to be.

My comprehension in all areas is not what it used to be.

 

[Finnie]

I believe that those produce stickers are required to be edible.

Ok, I guess I just contributed to another urban legend.

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/fruit-stickers-edible/

 

[gtaus]

I believe that those produce stickers are required to be edible.

Ok, I guess I just contributed to another urban legend.

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/fruit-stickers-edible/

I think there might be a big difference between compostable fruit stickers and edible fruit stickers. That link states that accidentally eating a fruit sticker is not going to hurt you because it's just plain paper for the label and the glue is food grade safe, but they don't recommend eating the labels. Sounds like the fruit stickers should be plenty safe for composting. I do not waste my time picking them off the fruit peels before I toss them in the chicken run. And, like I have said, I have yet to find any fruit lables when I sift the compost.

 

[gtaus]

I had to do a little maintenance inside my chicken coop today. The chickens have finally ripped up some of the cheap vinyl flooring I put on top the floor to protect the wood. So, I had to clean it up and staple the vinyl back to the side walls where it had ripped down.

I also ended up taking out 2 muck buckets full of soiled paper shreds. I had to remove the paper shreds to get to the vinyl to fix it, but also, frankly, it was beginning to smell. Totally my fault, I was trying to see if I could use less paper shreds that what I used in the past. Well, with 10 chickens in the coop, the area under the roosting bar got pretty soiled with only about 2-3 inches of paper shreds. Last year, I had a good 4-6 inches of paper shreds in the coop. So, I shoveled up the soiled paper shreds and dumped three bags full of new paper shreds under the roosting bar. As expected, the smell problem is now gone.

I have always been saying that my coop never smells using paper shreds, and I can stand by that, with the understanding that you really do need a nice 4-6 inches of paper shreds in the coop. Or, you just need to clean it out more often than my twice a year cleaning. I tried to use less paper shreds and it did not work for long term deep bedding. Volume matters and I should have used more paper shreds.

On the plus side, the two muck buckets full of paper shreds were very light to pick up and carry. When I used wood chips, I had to fill the muck buckets up less than half full, or it got too heavy for me to safely carry. Also, I broke a few muck buckets when I overloaded them with wood chips. The paper shreds are easier on my back and don't break the muck buckets either when full.

All in all, I'm still convinced that paper shreds are working out better for me than any other bedding litter I have used.

 

[Jenni Hen]

I've found that cross-cut thin paper shreds are best in the coop, and if I put in enough then there's no smell even first thing in the morning when I open the door. It's an Eglu with a grid of roosting bars over a plastic tray and I fill the flooring arrangement with shreds until the bars are just about visible.. They perch on the bars but poop onto the paper.

On the floor of the run, something more substantial is better - shredded twigs etc and straight-cut heavy duty paper or thin card worked well last winter. In spring/early summer I scraped out the loose stuff from the floor of the run and put it in trenches on my allotment plot, ready for planting climbing beans. I was delighted yesterday to be complimented, by a retired market gardener, on how well the beans have done! I gave due credit to the chickens

 

[gtaus]

I've found that cross-cut thin paper shreds are best in the coop, and if I put in enough then there's no smell even first thing in the morning when I open the door.

All my paper shredders are cross-cut. I wonder how micro shredder paper shreds would do in the coop?

I bought my cross-cut paper shredders at the Thrift Store for less than $5 each. I have yet to see a micro-cut shredder for sale there. I'd buy one for sure just to try it out.

I did not have enough paper shreds in the coop this summer. And when I mean I was starting to smell the coop, it was not overpowering or anything. But my highly sensitive nose picks up on the slightest indication of an ammonia smell and I need to add more fresh paper shreds. Usually, I stay ahead of the game and have only needed to clean out the coop twice a year. But, as I said, I had to do some maintenance on the vinyl floor covering in the coop so I decided just to take out the soiled paper shreds under the roosting bar, fix the linoleum, and put in fresh shreds. Not a full cleaning of about 10 muck buckets full of liter for the entire coop, just 2 muck buckets full from the litter directly below the roosting bar. I don't do my full fall cleaning until sometime in late October, right before we can expect snowfall.

On the floor of the run, something more substantial is better - shredded twigs etc and straight-cut heavy duty paper or thin card worked well last winter.

My paper shreds include not only office paper, mail, and newspapers, but also all the light cardboard boxes from cereal and other food products from the grocery store. The light cardboard shreds are more substantial than regular shredded paper. I have also shredded heavier packing cardboard boxes, and it works fine, but I find that that cutting up the cardboard boxes into strips for my shredders is generally not worth the effort when I have so much other paper that is much easier to shred.

I don't want to burn out my ~10-12-page max capacity shredders running heavy cardboard through them, so I have been cutting down the heavy cardboard into strips that go into the "credit card" slot of the shredder - which is usually 2-3 inches right in the middle of the shredder.

I once overloaded an older shredder with heavy stock. The teeth were fine on the shredder, but the plastic gears that turns those teeth broke under the pressure. Since then, I just feel it's better to keep the paper input under the max capacity rating of the machine.

For awhile, I was also mixing other litter in the coop along with the paper shreds, such as dried leaves and wood chips. I am all for using whatever free litter resources you can find that work for you. I really only use straight paper shreds now. I used up all my wood chips over a year ago, and although the dried leaves work just fine, they were also very dusty.

In spring/early summer I scraped out the loose stuff from the floor of the run and put it in trenches on my allotment plot, ready for planting climbing beans. I was delighted yesterday to be complimented, by a retired market gardener, on how well the beans have done! I gave due credit to the chickens

I compost all my coop litter. The paper shreds compost much faster than the wood chips I used to use as litter in the coop. Paper shreds also seem to compost faster than dried leaves, but the chickens can do an excellent job of ripping up dried leaves to bits and pieces as well.

I turned my entire chicken run into a chicken run composting system, so when I dump out my old paper shreds coop litter, I cover it up with a load of grass clippings from mowing the lawn. The green grass clippings prevent the paper shreds from blowing all over the yard while at the same time sped up the composting process. I try to keep a nice carbon to nitrogen ratio in my chicken run compost litter. All my organic material from around the house gets tossed into the chicken run. All my grass clippings, weeds from the garden, and all the fall leaves get tossed into the mix. It's all organic as I do not use any chemical sprays on my property.

I see my paper shreds composting down to useable material in about 3 months, but I let it sit at least 6 months so the chicken manure in the litter has a longer time to age and cool down. I have so much compost in my chicken run now that I am only harvesting compost that I started 2 years ago. I sift out the compost and add it to my raised bed gardens. It works great and my plants just exploded this year. Very, very, very happy with the results using my chicken run compost. I don't use any other chemical fertilizers.

 

[gtaus]

Looking forward to hearing your results. Sounds like a lot of work to separate the cardboard from the plastic. Those boxes I just recycle. But I am trying to use as much of that paper material I can.

I don't have too much cardboard box material to recycle. So I am OK with using my plain old heavy duty scissors to cut the cardboard into strips. If I had lots of heavy cardboard, I think I'd invest in the WORX WX081L 4V ZipSnip Cordless Electric Scissors because I hear they work great for breaking down the cardboard.

View attachment 2917924

At $40.00 for the ZipSnips, I would have to have a lot more cardboard to cut into strips than I currently get. My old hands have a touch of arthritis, but my wallet is even in more pain......

Following up on a prior post I made almost 2 years ago...

I just bought one of those cordless power cutters from Harbor Freight, on sale, last week for $24.99 for the Inside Track Club (ITC) members.

For the ITC members, the price for this power cutter is currently $24.99. However, when I bought my power cutter, I had a $15.00 gift certificate of Harbor Freight money for my birthday plus another $5.00 Harbor Freights reward money from my HF credit card. So, I was looking at only $5.00 out of pocket for this purchase. Even better, when I bought this power cutter last week, I got a free 4-pack of tie downs with my purchase...

First Time Usage Review of the HF Power Cutter

I thought I would use this power cutter to cut heavier cardboard into strips to put down the center of my paper shredder's credit card slot in the middle. I did not want to bog down my paper shredder with wide sheets of heavy cardboard and risk burning out the motor or breaking parts in the machine.

Tonight, we had an empty cardboard pizza box to put into the recycle bin after supper. However, I used my new power cutter to cut the box into 2-3 inch wide strips. Very easy to cut with this power cutter compared to using a manual scissors. If you don't have good hand strength, then you will really appreciate this power cutter.

The cardboard pizza box strips I cut up into strips went down really easy in the shredder. No bogging down at all, no problem at all....

The heavy cardboard adds a little more variety and body to the paper shreds I use in the chicken coop litter. It's a good way to use up heavy cardboard instead of hauling it off to the recycle bins or center. I am now shredding almost all my paper products at home, including the heavy cardboard from now on.

Overall, I would give this HF power cutter a 4/5 star rating. 5 stars for the way it works, especially if you have weaker hands, but maybe only 3 or 4 stars for value because I don't think I really needed it, but it does make it easier to cut that heavy cardboard that I did not even bother with before. I would not buy it just for making "free" chicken coop litter, but, of course, this power cutter can be used for lots of different things. I suspect I will find more uses for this power cutter now that I have one.

As a bonus, the HF power cutter comes with an extra blade. The charger has also been updated to using a standard mini USB connection in place of the proprietary charger that could only be used with this power cutter. I tested the charger out on one of my cell phones and it charged it up no problems.

 

[paintedChix]

Let me ask again.... Does anyone have a good way to shred newspaper?

What about layering it w/ "harder" cards stock or regular paper?

I actually shred paper towels & napkins, but sandwich them between folded cereal box...

Looks like I don't have a pic of that, but tucked between the 2 halves of this box would work...

https://photos.app.goo.gl/dwPqia2pTKtbJhJ88

 

[gtaus]

What about layering it [newspaper] w/ "harder" cards stock or regular paper?

I actually shred paper towels & napkins, but sandwich them between folded cereal box...

Thanks for the great ideas. The problem with those soft papers, like newspapers and paper towels, is that they get wrapped around the shredder rollers and jam up everything. I'll have to sandwich them between some light cardboard and see how that works on my shredder. Already, I like the idea. Thanks.

FYI, I have been experimenting with shredding newspapers using the top shredder portion on top of a big garbage can out in the garage. I can easily reach under the shredder and pull the newspaper off the rollers when it starts to wrap around and jam the machine. Also, since the garbage can is so much bigger than the original shredder bin, it does not fill up as fast and the newspaper has more of a chance to fall down.