Wood Shavings?

[Van Diemen]

Hi everyone,

Just a quick question about the layer of stuff on the bottom of Teddies cage - substrate? I'm awful with the technicalities!! lol.

I use wood shavings from P@H - is this bad???

They don't particularly smell of anything strong like pine and they are very soft, but I've seen a few people say these can be bad for hamsters health...

I just bought the same ones that P@H have in their display tanks.

Any advice would be great!!!

[kyrilliondaemon]

We used them for a while perfectly fine - Skip still uses them

Some advise against wood shavings because they may contain phenols which are bad for the hams, but plenty use them perfectly safely. In the end we only changed because we had a really bad batch and didn't want to use them after finding bits of cardboard in with them. Once we weren't buying from P@H it made sense to reconsider substrate entirely and we ended up settling for something that wasn't shavings.

Its all personal preference though and if you air/sieve them before use they'll be less dusty and less likely to still contain the phenols that might be bad.

[Van Diemen]

Thanks for the response!

Don't suppose you could tell me more about these phenols thingies??? lol

[Hammymad]

I have always used the wood shavings and never had any problems with them (apart from them getting everywhere when they stick in the long haired hammies bum fur lol)
Like Kyrill said its all about personal preference and personal experience,if any of my hams did develop problems I would then of course change it to somethng else. X

[kyrilliondaemon]

Er... Basically they're a chemical given off with the smell of the woodshavings. They're suspected of causing some forms of cancer in rodents who live on them. Its not been confirmed though, and airing them out before use really reduces the amount of scent and phenols present.

Is that clear enough? I tried to keep it as simple as I can to avoid confusion but if anything is unclear or you want to know more, please do ask.

[cathface]

I also use the woodshavings, just because I didn't have time to order some aubiose or the like before I brought my ham up from London. he was in wood shavings before and still uses it now, and he's had no adverse effects, so I might keep him on woodshavings unless they start posing a problem. although I did consider getting aubiose simply because it came in such large quantities, and with my ham in a 100 x 40cm tank, it would make more sense to buy a big batch delivered than constantly having to pop down to P@H for woodshavings.

[Van Diemen]

Perfectly clear thank you!

I didn't know any of that - I don't air them at all

I will start doing so now though - thank you!

Glad to hear you haven't had problems Hammy! It's reassuring, I was getting really paranoid for a few mins there lol

[Van Diemen]

Thanks Cath!

[StarlightSerenity]

This article might interest you - http://www.hammysworld.com/index.php?p=corinnefayo

I use woodshavings, never had a problem with them, I don't air them as I believe that will do more harm than good - damp, germs etc (plus dust!) that's in the air will just get into them. I have a very dusty house as well (it's purple too, god only knows why!) so it certainly isn't a viable option for me. Of course, you can get dodgy, dust filled bags with bits in them (I bought Wilkinsons shavings once, it had bits of green plastic in it) but on a whole, woodshavings are just as safe as the other commercial substrates. Some hamsters are allergic to shavings but I think you'll find thats the case with most substrates. A few just won't be good on them.

[Hammymad]

Yeah it can worry you when you hear things like that,as we all want the best for our hams.Glad my response reassured you xx