Bedding

[BenD188]

I use fleece in my main cage for my two chinchillas and it works great. I just got another chinchilla that has his own smaller cage. It has kd pine bedding which I do not like. I do not like for a couple reasons. First, it is messy when it flies out of the cage and is hard to get out of carpet!! Second I don't like the smell that it has. It smells like bedding which to me smells like animals.

I have used carefresh once before and I liked it better. Would that be alright for them? I have heard mixed things about it. Would it be a problem if they ate it? It says non-toxic.

 

[ChipNOreo]

I used carefresh with mine for a few years. However, mine were never interested in eating it. I switched because carefresh costs 3 times as much as 3 times the amount in a wood shavings bag of bedding. I use aspen and I find that it smells a lot less than the KD pine I have tried.

 

[Chinniechantel]

Haha, what is wrong with smelling like animals?

 

[Essentia]

Have you thought about switching him over to fleece as well? I use fleece for every chin that comes through here (unless I see them chewing on it). I find out which corner they use for their pee corner, and I put a litter box there on top of the fleece. So far I have had fantastic luck and all of them have "potty trained" themselves. Even if they were to pee on the fleece it is still easier for me to take it out every few days and wash it.

Is there a particular reason you want this one to remain on bedding?

Also, with carefresh it has been hit or miss with me. Most of my chins were eating it so it got pulled from the cage.

 

[jmdebb]

I tried carefresh too once before in all my cages, and although I LOVED the way it worked on the smell, all mine looked like they were eating it, and I didn't want to chance anything happening to them even tho it does say non-toxic so I stopped using it.

Why is it that when you find something great that works great, something else happens so you can't use it. Murphy's Law I guess.

Jean

 

[CerLynn]

We use Carefresh and love it. As mentioned though, some chins like to make a meal of it, so watch to make sure they're not ingesting it (a couple nibbles here and there won't hurt, but actual ingestion isn't good).

 

[Ristarwen]

I've used CareFresh, KD pine, and just bought Sunseed's Fresh World bedding to try it out... Anyone used that at all? It's a paper bedding, a lot like CareFresh, but is in a soft pelleted form instead of paper "lumps". I really like the paper-based beddings, though, at least until I get my chinkids on fleece.

 

[AZChins]

Has anyone ever heard of making something surprisingly similar to CareFresh at home with old newspapers? It's cheap and easy to make. I posted about it on another forum...but let me know if anyone would like to know how to make it.

I use pine shavings...I have 134 cages at the time and I need something that I can compost easily outside! And, I can clean all the cages for about $9. I can't imagine cleaning cages twice a week and using Carefresh.

Use what works for you. That's the best thing you can do. (HA! That rhymes...me so funny.)