Food service boxes = poultry bedding

[HighDesertHippie]

So one of the many people who live with me, (A symptom of being a millennial who didn't have their education paid for and wasn't left a mansion or a small loan of a million dollars.....) either way, see how I turn dozens of cardboard boxes that carried little sandwiches and fancy coffee to the Starbucks into a viable bedding and thus eggs for the kitchen....I present...

Redneck fake desert straw

 

[HighDesertHippie]

 

[HighDesertHippie]

The price of hay for the high desert went up to 25 a bale this fall. We are the only people in fernley recycling any form of refuse as far as I can currently tell. I get about 12 bags of coffee grounds from starbucks also and am using it to both acidity and add nitrogen to my soil.

By this summer I should be curing the cardboard quail manure mix for testing

 

[HighDesertHippie]

Also planning to get two of the budget shredders from our site here, one for tobacco and one to process my quail bedding from cardboard. Do any of you home grown tobacco pros think shredding cardboard with a seperate but identical shredder would be a problem?

 

[TigerTom]

Not a pro by any means, but what type of shredder are you talking about?

I don't know that many home office shredders are designed to handle cardboard. You may end up burning out the motor.

 

[HighDesertHippie]

Not a pro by any means, but what type of shredder are you talking about?

I don't know that many home office shredders are designed to handle cardboard. You may end up burning out the motor.

I mean, this is exactly the problem I am running into in my own mind and why I am sitting here with a beer and a pair of scissors.

One wonders if a shredder designed for something as tough and leathery as tobacco may be able to go through. I can't afford a 300 dollar shredder any more than I can afford 25 dollar bales of hay from wadsworth, so any idea that turns these unlimited free boxes into bedding for my nearly cost free quail I am 100% open too

 

[TigerTom]

I mean, this is exactly the problem I am running into in my own mind and why I am sitting here with a beer and a pair of scissors.

One wonders if a shredder designed for something as tough and leathery as tobacco may be able to go through. I can't afford a 300 dollar shredder any more than I can afford 25 dollar bales of hay from wadsworth, so any idea that turns these unlimited free boxes into bedding for my nearly cost free quail I am 100% open too

Tobacco shredders typically cut through leaf that is in case, meaning at the proper moisture level.

Cardboard boxes are fairly dry. As you are undoubtedly aware, moistening cardboard before shredding would render it useless for quail.

There isn't much comparison between tobacco leaves and cardboard. Tobacco leaves may be tough and leathery as leaves go, but about the only leaves I can think of that come close to the strength of (man-made) cardboard would be something like a stack of camphor tree leaves. If you've never dealt with them, they take years to break down just laying around the yard. In other words, cardboard is much tougher.

Here is a video I found of a cheap Harbor Freight electric chipper shredder converted for shredding cardboard. If you're so Inclined, you could give it a go.

View: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=L4bKBEXRgz0

 

[Alpine]

When I was younger, I used sawdust for bedding my poultry. If there’s a cabinet maker or a sawmill near you, they may be happy to get rid of it at small cost, or even for free.

pier

 

[tullius]

^what pier said^. or a paper/cardboard shredding/recycling place if they let it go for free. let someone else do that work for you

whatever you do, don't use a good tobacco shredder on corrugated cardboard: it'll trash it in short order

 

[ChinaVoodoo]

Perhaps this would work. It's an expensive experiment.

Wood Chippers + Log Splitters | Sun Joe®

Sun Joe’s electric chippers and electric splitters are #1 rated. The perfect choice for making light work of fallen tree limbs and for splitting firewood.

www.snowjoe.com

 

[deluxestogie]

From the images on that Snowjoe leaf mincer, the user boldly sprinkles in nearly a half-dozen leaves at a time.

Bob

 

[ChinaVoodoo]

It's questionable. I saw one at Canadian Tire and I think it says it can handle sticks up to 1/2". I assume one at a time. I imagine it could handle soft stuff like raspberry really well.

 

[GreenDragon]

I don't think the quail care if it's fluffy or not. If it were me, I'd just break down the boxes along the creases, then take a utility knife and score both sides with cuts an inch or so apart. I'm assuming the idea is to cover the garage floor and prepare the boxes for composting.

 

[HighDesertHippie]

Sadly the nearest sawmill is a 4 hour drive and on the California side of mount rose. The only real wood I could get my hands on to shred myself would be fourwing saltbush or freemont cottonwood (bacon tree) both of which I would have to go on a nice little walk to get. We have a few chip plants and a Tesla factory in town......lots of horse people

 

[HighDesertHippie]

I don't think the quail care if it's fluffy or not. If it were me, I'd just break down the boxes along the creases, then take a utility knife and score both sides with cuts an inch or so apart. I'm assuming the idea is to cover the garage floor and prepare the boxes for composting.

Basically this, and to keep my dumb mini chickens from slipping all over the cardboard and hurting themselves. Believe it or not we have been down this road already

 

[HighDesertHippie]

Tobacco shredders typically cut through leaf that is in case, meaning at the proper moisture level.

Cardboard boxes are fairly dry. As you are undoubtedly aware, moistening cardboard before shredding would render it useless for quail.

There isn't much comparison between tobacco leaves and cardboard. Tobacco leaves may be tough and leathery as leaves go, but about the only leaves I can think of that come close to the strength of (man-made) cardboard would be something like a stack of camphor tree leaves. If you've never dealt with them, they take years to break down just laying around the yard. In other words, cardboard is much tougher.

Here is a video I found of a cheap Harbor Freight electric chipper shredder converted for shredding cardboard. If you're so Inclined, you could give it a go.

View: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=L4bKBEXRgz0

And this thing looks like it wants to mangle somebody real bad

 

[ChinaVoodoo]

Sadly the nearest sawmill is a 4 hour drive and on the California side of mount rose. The only real wood I could get my hands on to shred myself would be fourwing saltbush or freemont cottonwood (bacon tree) both of which I would have to go on a nice little walk to get. We have a few chip plants and a Tesla factory in town......lots of horse people

I was implying that you could send your cardboard through it.

 

[ChinaVoodoo]

I like the DIY idea. It shouldn't be too difficult to create something robust and cheap.

 

[TigerTom]

And this thing looks like it wants to mangle somebody real bad

I had a similar thought, though a guard could be made for it.

You could probably leave it unmodified, roll the cardboard up so as to resemble branches, and use it like a regular chipper shredder.

Safer and it may produce an adequate shred.