In my recent travels this year i came upon A rather unusual and new type of bedding, made from flax of all things, eh? This was actually at an entirely horse dedicated show but this bedding is quite suitable for others creatures and is touted as such by the company, obviously for the sake of this forum i am referring to it's use with poultry.
The claim to fame with this bedding is it's lightweight, virtually dust free and absorbent qualities. I have only just begun with this product so my intent is to continually update on the progress of it's value and use with my birds.
First off i will provide you with the company site... (Note- this is not an American site but possible the same brand is available or similar made by other companies, for the sake of accuracy i am using this brand so will refer to their site)
http://flaxbed.ca/
The bags are made of a recyclable material, it's quite a tall, slim bag which as a shorter person i find slightly humorous to lift, that said it is lighter than a traditional softwood shaving bale, which is compacted and heavy.
I generally use a combination of softwood shavings and wood pellet bedding, no real complaints but it does require double product, i prefer not to use straight wood pellet as they can be rather slippery until dissolved making it harder to walk upon this would be especially true for ducklings.
My standard shaving bag, a compressed block basically(this one was open, so more slack)
Sorry wood pellets i am out of but this gives you an idea, it's a 40lb bag
These are what they look like undissolved.
This is my calls duck "brooder"(aka dog crate lol) this is what a combo of the shavings and wood pellets becomes, while you can see some wood pellet, quite a bit has broken down, it becomes this almost dust free power which is very absorbent and low odour.
I showed you my current bedding so one can understand what is being used for comparison.. my chickens are bedded on straight softwood shavings as they are not as wet as the ducks are.
Now back to the flax..
This is a pic from the top of the bag, just opened it's filled right to the top.
Showing you this bucket, so i can show the after of how little dust remained, i decided to toss some into the chickens box in their run and throw some around the ducks barn.
After, you can see how there is practically no dust left in this bucket, i didn't wipe it down, just simply shook the bedding out of the pail.
Showing you how you can actually touch this bare handed, it's neither poky nor sharp, actually quite soft in comparison to softwood shavings or straw.
My plan is to use this in a brooder, i have 6 silkie chicks arriving and 2 buff ducks, i also depending on the results of my experience plan to switch my duck barn and chicken coop over to this, the dust difference is definitely notable, i was bare handed putting this into the bucket and i saw no cloud of anything. While wood pellet bedding does reduce the dust, shavings do produce some.
For reference of price points
bag of flax 6.50$
bale of shavings 4.95$
wood pellet bedding 5.99$
While prices will vary, it's is fairly on par with other bedding price points.
I will continue to update and give progress reports on how it's worked, i am curious as to it's nesting qualities as my ladies all mound up the shavings to create nests, it will be interesting to see if this can perform as well. I will also be most critical of how it will behave with the wet environment of ducks especially while brooding.
The claim to fame with this bedding is it's lightweight, virtually dust free and absorbent qualities. I have only just begun with this product so my intent is to continually update on the progress of it's value and use with my birds.
First off i will provide you with the company site... (Note- this is not an American site but possible the same brand is available or similar made by other companies, for the sake of accuracy i am using this brand so will refer to their site)
http://flaxbed.ca/
The bags are made of a recyclable material, it's quite a tall, slim bag which as a shorter person i find slightly humorous to lift, that said it is lighter than a traditional softwood shaving bale, which is compacted and heavy.
I generally use a combination of softwood shavings and wood pellet bedding, no real complaints but it does require double product, i prefer not to use straight wood pellet as they can be rather slippery until dissolved making it harder to walk upon this would be especially true for ducklings.
I showed you my current bedding so one can understand what is being used for comparison.. my chickens are bedded on straight softwood shavings as they are not as wet as the ducks are.
Now back to the flax..
My plan is to use this in a brooder, i have 6 silkie chicks arriving and 2 buff ducks, i also depending on the results of my experience plan to switch my duck barn and chicken coop over to this, the dust difference is definitely notable, i was bare handed putting this into the bucket and i saw no cloud of anything. While wood pellet bedding does reduce the dust, shavings do produce some.
For reference of price points
bag of flax 6.50$
bale of shavings 4.95$
wood pellet bedding 5.99$
While prices will vary, it's is fairly on par with other bedding price points.
I will continue to update and give progress reports on how it's worked, i am curious as to it's nesting qualities as my ladies all mound up the shavings to create nests, it will be interesting to see if this can perform as well. I will also be most critical of how it will behave with the wet environment of ducks especially while brooding.
