hey, i\'m Sarah. i have an adorable 1 year old male ducth/dwarf mix bunny named Brown Sugar. i got him about a year ago & have always wondered what was the best bedding for him.he is litter box trained. (he\'s a indoor bunny) i\'ve tried cedar & pine,but i read that the dust irritates a bunnies respiratory system. i\'ve also tried aspen, but all the shavings make a mess! so i tried putting newspaper on the bottom of the cage, the next morning he had shredded all the paper & it was a mess. i had also thought of using a paper shredder to shred the newspaper to make my on bedding. HELP! what kind of bedding should i use for my bunny that won\'t make a mess & is healthy for him!?
I have always used pine shavings (do not use cedar, it is poisonous to rabbits if he eats it) or you could try the woodstove pellets..they are cheap and absorb moisture really well, so you dont have to use very much. If you dont want him to make a mess I would suggest a cage with a wire bottom so that the droppings fall through and he doesnt have anything to kick out
Good Luck!
thanks for the reply, i heard that pine scented shavings can cause liver damage to bunnies & irritate their respiratory system!& about the wire cage bottom, i read that the bars make sours on bunnies little feet. what are woodstove pellets? & what do you think about using shredded newspaper?
Woodstove pellets, or wood fuel pellets are pellets that are highly processed compressed wood scraps or dust that resemble pine litter products, such as \"Feline Pine.\" It is a seasonal item sold at few stores, and they are used to burn as fuel for heat in wood burning stoves. Rabbit owners have discovered what wonderful litter it makes and it cost about 1/4th the price of wood pellet litter.
I like using Aspen because I can dump the soiled litter around my flowers for mulch. I have also used wood fuel pellets, and they work great. I like to put newspaper on the bottom of my litter boxes, litter on top of the paper, and then cover it with hay that I get by the bale from a friend who has horses. I tried shredded newspaper before, but found it to be too much work and my rabbits went through a lot of it in a very short time.
I think your rabbit is rips up the newspaper because it gives him something to do and keeps him from getting bored. Try giving him more hay to chew on or some sticks. My rabbits like Crab Apple and Liliac branches with bark on them. You could also try putting some of his food pellets inside of a toilet paper tube and fold up the ends so he has to try to figure out how to get the pellets. Anything to keep him busy would help.
All good suggestions
I use the white pine shavings from Shar-Kare, they arent scented, or have \'additives\' or anything and they come in large flakes which cuts down on the fine dust that can also aggravate bunnies respiratory systems. However all of my rabbits are outside in my unheated garage, so they have lots of ventilation as well. Shredded newspaper might work however watch that he doesnt get covered in ink when it gets wet.
The wire floors dont have to cause sores on their feet, depending on the size of your bunny (and his feet lol), and the size of the wire spaces in the floor. I have no problems with my rabbits on wire floors except for my Mini Rex which have a tendancy to get sore hocks....so I put resting boards in thier cages. These can be anything form the commercial \"EZ Mats\" made out of corrugated plastic but even cardboard or a piece of wood would work. Some make their messes on them however most do not and it solves the probelm of sores
Woody pet is the best product i have ever used.You can buy it at tractor supply.bluebird
Pine shavings do not cause liver damage. More info can be found about that at
http://www.geocities.com/heavyhitter1.geo/Pine.html
As far as irritating respiratory system, well some rabbits are allergic to it but otherwise unless it\'s avery dusty and the rabbit is kicking that dust up there shouldn\'t be a problem. Those who say it affects the respiratory system are basing it on studies done at sawmills on workers there. Given those conditions would be much different than using it for litter I\'d say all it tells us is don\'t let your rabbit get a job in a sawmill.
Bucky\'s site is a good site for pine shavings. I wish there were more sites like that out there clarifying that whats been said about pine is false. Now bucky and I dont always see eye to eye some things, but that website is oneof my favorite links.
What i would recommend is to use kiln dried. Its not as smelly as regular pine. I get mine from tsc tractor supply.
If you dont want to use pine, yesterdays news and carefresh are also good to use. Just a little more expensive.
I have to admit, I have used pine shavings for years (over 40) in my rabbits\' nest boxes with no ill effects that I could determine.
I have read numerous articles to the contrary, however. Because my rabbits are outdoor bunnies, I would assume the greater ventilation could be a factor in minimizing any harmful effects. I have always purchased my shavings by the bale and have not seen aspen offered in this quantity. (At least not that I could afford.)
I think that if one wanted to \"play it safe\", it certainly couldn\'t hurt to use hardwood shavings as opposed to pine. Laboratories also purchase their bedding material in bulk, so it really isn\'t cost effective for them to purchase hardwood shavings.
If it makes folks that have one or two house bunnies feel better to purchase hardwood shavings for their pets, I say go for it.
Charlcie Gill
Zodiac Rabbitry
Astoria, OR
http://www.zodiacsatins.com
\"I have read numerous articles to the contrary, however. Because my rabbits are outdoor bunnies, I would assume the greater ventilation could be a factor in minimizing any harmful effects.\"
So have I but they all pretty much echo just a few articles. One is the HR$ one that really says nothing and proves nothing. I mean if you used shavings and spayed hundreds of rabbits who lived on it why would that be the cause of 1 rabbit\'s death. I had a discussion with Harriman on her article, very disappointing, she couldn\'t defend it and then just sent me to Flentke who wrote alot about why cats can\'t eat what is it aspirin or tylenol and then ended it with so that\'s probably alot like how pine shavings work, Right. And one by one of their people-Flentke or something like that who says it causes cancer but there aren\'t studies that show that, they show that there doesn\'t seem to be any connection. And then one by forget the name Jeffy, jeffers, something like that, but you read the bottom of his article and it turns out he\'s a student and I suspect his article is a class assignment. But all it\'s about is a summary of studies done on sawmill workers.
I have actually read the studies on HME induction and then learned more about it, it just doesn\'t show there is a problem. The thing is when people say play it safe it\'s like suggesting that there is evidence that there is a problem, but the bottomline is there isn\'t. I always jump on the pine/cedar thing because I ended up spending an awful lot of time reading and understanding the studies and heck finding them were hard, and then came the article.
My husband is a research scientist with our state so he helped me alot. He was able to access the studies via his labs library and helped me understand some of the concepts. One really important thing I learned was how dose and concentration affects everything. Like a substance could be deadly in a certain concentration but be safe at a lower amount.