Bedding and Litter and Vermin Village

I have some updates to this post.  After several years under my belt, I've refined my preferences.

Rats get fleece in the cage and Good News (or other paper pelleted litter) in the litter boxes.  I get the fleece cheap from either Ikea or Joanne's fabrics.  The fleece is tossed after use.

Mice get Good News (or other paper pelleted litter) as the main substrate and then I add tissues and shredded paper, or Clean and Cozy for nesting material.  The paper pellets are better at controlling the odor.  The best place in the Portland metro area that I know of to get Good News is Winco.

The gerbils get crinkle kraft paper that I order from Staples in 10# boxes.  I provide paper and tissue and some Clean and Cozy for nesting material.  They seem to really love shredding it and tunneling through it.

Hamsters get Kaytee's Clean and Cozy.  I find the crinkle paper tends to stick to them if they have longer fur.  I order this from petmountain.com.  I used to order it from Drs Foster and Smith but when they were taken over by Petco, they stopped offering the pet store size and it became too expensive.

I wanted to provide the updates because after 10+ years experience, this is what I have found works best here.

Previous information:

I've tried many items for bedding and litter.  I use Good Mews in my litter boxes and in the mouse cages.  It controls odor well.  It is heavy though so while I have used it in my cages, due to the number of cages I have and where the cages are located I prefer not to use it in the cage bases.

I've used wooden pellets but they smelled funny to me.  I was not a fan of the aspen shavings.  I did like the Aspen Sani Chips but the ratties had so much fun tossing them out and it is expensive to get.

I'm currently finishing up the Douglas Fir shavings I have and have been pretty pleased with them but the large bales sometimes have a dampness to them so I have to let them dry.  The smaller bales are better about being dry.

I just recently purchased rice hulls at the feed store.  I've used it in several cages so far.  A bale lasts me for at least 2 cleanings of all of my cages and the bales are available locally at NW Concentrates for $14 as of this posting.  It is better if I give the area of the cages, which is 8784 inches.  This is just the area where the hulls are placed.  It is good for a week, with little odor at that time.  It absorbs well.  The rats do like to dig in it so it is best with deep pans of at least 3 inches, but it does vacuum easily and is less likely to clog the hose because the pieces are small and uniform in size.  There is little to no dust.  The bedding itself has barely any scent and certainly nothing to irritate sensitive rattie noses.

In the gerbil cages I just use shredded newspaper.  In the hamster cages they get rice hulls and newspaper.  In the mouse cages I use Good Mews and newspaper.

The downside with rice hulls is the difficulty in finding them where rice is not grown.  Luckily Portland has a place that orders it from the Davis, California area.