Hi, I'm looking in to getting my first piggies and am considering hemp bedding as the substrate. Does anyone use hemp bedding? Please let me know the pros and cons. I also considered lined fleece, however I think it would be more smelly and also more time consuming to clean. If anybody has tried both, I would love to know your experience.
Hemp bedding vs lined fleece
- Thread starter MaryT
- Start date
LeeLee_:)
Junior Guinea Pig
I haven’t used hemp bedding, but I used paper bedding before I got liners. Since you mentioned feeling that liners would be hard to clean, I thought I’d put my experience with that here. The fleece was actually easier to clean than I expected, as all I have to do is sweep out poo and hay when it gets messy and switch them out about every week. If you do get fleece, I recommend going for the better quality liners and spending the extra money as most of the cheaper liners are barely better than using disposable pee pads. As for cleaning hemp bedding, I would think it would be similar to cleaning paper bedding. For me cleaning the paper bedding was much more time consuming and messy. Having to buy new bags of bedding all the time also adds up and can get expensive. Hopefully someone with experience using hemp bedding sees your post soon!
T-Rex
Forum Donator 2023/24
Hi. Welcome to the forum.
You might find this thread helpful
Bedding For Guinea Pigs - Overview
Personally I’ve use fleece on one side and disposable bedding on my hay side. I’ve used hemp bedding and found it fine.
Both have their merits, you might need to try them out to find your preference.
I don’t find fleece smelly and I spot clean whichever bedding I use so time wise not too bad, but obviously fleece needs cleaning, washing and drying so that takes more time, but I enjoy having less waste. I have a very large cage so disposable bedding would create a lot of waste and cost more for me.
You might find this thread helpful
Bedding For Guinea Pigs - Overview
Personally I’ve use fleece on one side and disposable bedding on my hay side. I’ve used hemp bedding and found it fine.
Both have their merits, you might need to try them out to find your preference.
I don’t find fleece smelly and I spot clean whichever bedding I use so time wise not too bad, but obviously fleece needs cleaning, washing and drying so that takes more time, but I enjoy having less waste. I have a very large cage so disposable bedding would create a lot of waste and cost more for me.
My piggies live in my shed so I have to use a disposable bedding topped with hay.
I find cleaning it easy but it creates a lot of waste. Luckily my council take small animal waste and hay in our garden recycling bins but not all will do make sure you check there you can dispose of it.
It obviously costs to keep buying more bedding. I have found a local farm which sell it in 20kg bales very cheaply (when compared to other places).
I use fleece when they come inside in the summer. It is easy to shake off and pop in the machine and as I only use it for limited periods in summer so I know I can dry it outside.
I don’t think I’d want to use it all the time though (if my piggies were permanently indoors) as I would find drying it indoors in winter a bit tedious.
I find cleaning it easy but it creates a lot of waste. Luckily my council take small animal waste and hay in our garden recycling bins but not all will do make sure you check there you can dispose of it.
It obviously costs to keep buying more bedding. I have found a local farm which sell it in 20kg bales very cheaply (when compared to other places).
I use fleece when they come inside in the summer. It is easy to shake off and pop in the machine and as I only use it for limited periods in summer so I know I can dry it outside.
I don’t think I’d want to use it all the time though (if my piggies were permanently indoors) as I would find drying it indoors in winter a bit tedious.
I would think a lot will depend on where your piggies live and the type of cage they are in.
I have used both hemp and fleece, and with indoor piggies found fleece much easier to keep clean. The issue is not only the cleaning in the cage, but the hemp got everywhere and I spent half my life sweeping the floor around the cage (thank goodness we have tile).
So it would help to know where and how your piggies are kept.
I have used both hemp and fleece, and with indoor piggies found fleece much easier to keep clean. The issue is not only the cleaning in the cage, but the hemp got everywhere and I spent half my life sweeping the floor around the cage (thank goodness we have tile).
So it would help to know where and how your piggies are kept.
Thanks for your replies. My piggies will be indoors. I'm from Australia and it seems from the forums here that one of the most popular bedding options is to use toggle bath mats with puppy pads or reusable liners on the bottom. Apparently it is easier to clean as you just need to shake the mat outside whereas hay and hair sticks to fleece more easily so you'll need to brush it off. I will try that and see how I go.
Apples
New Born Pup
I've used hemp, bath mats and now fleece liners. I think it comes down to personal preference since all have their pros and cons so I'll share some of my experience as well.
I found the bath mats are most smelly. After a day or two I would already start smelling some pee. The hemp wouldn't start getting smelly for a week or so, but it does have its own smell from the moment you take it out the bag and put it in the cage. It's not unpleasant but it is there. My fleece starts smelling in the high traffic areas after 3-4 days, but I use several smaller liners and pee pads so I don't need to clean out the entire cage each time. I find liners of 2x2 grids in size the easiest to handle and wash, while still having sufficient weight and size that they don't slide around when the piggies run around on them.
The hemp didn't require much spot cleaning. It hides the poos really well. Once I switched to bath mats and fleece I realized how much piggies poo! So the fleece and bath mats require more frequent spot cleaning. On the other hand, cleaning the cage when I was using hemp was more of an effort than with fleece/bath mats since the correx base would get gross where there is a lot of peeing on the hemp bedding. And I needed to sweep the room all the time since the hemp was everywhere after some zoomies and popcorning. So in the end I guess both require about the same amount of time and effort cleaning.
I found the bath mats are most smelly. After a day or two I would already start smelling some pee. The hemp wouldn't start getting smelly for a week or so, but it does have its own smell from the moment you take it out the bag and put it in the cage. It's not unpleasant but it is there. My fleece starts smelling in the high traffic areas after 3-4 days, but I use several smaller liners and pee pads so I don't need to clean out the entire cage each time. I find liners of 2x2 grids in size the easiest to handle and wash, while still having sufficient weight and size that they don't slide around when the piggies run around on them.
The hemp didn't require much spot cleaning. It hides the poos really well. Once I switched to bath mats and fleece I realized how much piggies poo! So the fleece and bath mats require more frequent spot cleaning. On the other hand, cleaning the cage when I was using hemp was more of an effort than with fleece/bath mats since the correx base would get gross where there is a lot of peeing on the hemp bedding. And I needed to sweep the room all the time since the hemp was everywhere after some zoomies and popcorning. So in the end I guess both require about the same amount of time and effort cleaning.
Thanks for sharing your experience. Can I ask which bedding you've decided to go with after trying all of these? Did you find it a bit more time consuming to use fleece instead of bath mats because a lot of fur and hay gets stuck to it? Do your bath mats have a rubber or latex backing on it?
Apples
New Born Pup
I’m using the fleece in the end. The mats would probably safe me a few minutes in getting hay and hairs off, but that time is not worth the increased smell compared to the fleece for me.
It isn't as hard as it seems to get things off fleece either. I use a rubber brush and run in under the tap before use so it is a bit wet. That way the hairs will clump together and come off more easily rather than fly back to the fleece from static cling.
My bath mats sort of had a backing, but it’s not a continuous layer, more of a porous film if you get what I mean. Urine wouldn’t be pooling in the mats but seep through.