Kitchen area

[cass2sons]

What do you add to their kitchen area? I was using, fleece, I was constantly cleaning it, then I used newspaper and that stinks. I then used shavings which was a mess five minutes after I put it in. haha! what do you use that's not messy?

Cassandra

[twenty909]

I use a small wash basin for the litter about 1/3rd filled with aspen chips, then a layer of Carefresh packed tightly on top. They took a few minutes to figure out how to jump in, but soon figured it out. I have a couple of bricks holding it tight that also provide a step if they want.The hay rack hangs right over top of the basin. I covered the fleece with a small dollar store scatter mat to catch most of the stray hay. The mat is brightly colored so never looks very untidy, except for the beans they leave everywhere. No solution for that one except constant picking them up! I use a dollar store large cooking spoon for those.

[gooberific]

I use a couple cat pans from Walmart, they were under $2 for the smallest ones. My pigs can hop over them easily, but I also have a brick between them (under their water bottle) to keep them in place against the sides of their kitchen.

For 'bedding', I use a few layers of newspaper and a bunch of carefresh.

To scoop mine, I use my son's plastic shovel that came with his cheap sand bucket (the shovel is pink, and we don't have a sandbox anyway -- we use the bucket for all his crayons and markers).

[PixieStix]

I have a small animal litter pan filled with a layer of pine pellet bedding (it's dried and I air it out before use), and I have their hay rack above that. The pellets are VERY absorbant and are heavy so the pigs can't shove the box around easily. I've tried aspen, which was messy and smelly, and not as absorbant as the pellets, and carefresh, which again I didnt' like as much (and the pigs decided to eat BOTH of those materials). I used to focus on keeping the hay in the box and rack, but now I just put hay piles all over the fleece.

[paula.m.moore]

I actually use 12 quart dish pans. Two fit perfectly side-by-side at the end of a 2 x whatever size cage. They are about 5-6" tall and the bigger pigs have no problem hopping in and out but for the smaller pigs I just put a brick in front kind of like a stepping block.

I fill them with Carefresh, which doesn't make a mess all over the fleece like shavings do. And the dishpans are only $1.50-$2.00.

Here's a picture of the dishpans similar to what I use:

[Jenni_Feathers]

I don't really have a kitchen area but I do have 2 hay/potty boxes. One of them is a medium sized walmart cat pan and the other is a 12 qt dish pan. I put about 1" of shaving in them and then fill them the rest of the way with hay and change them everyother day.

[cass2sons]

Thank you everyone for sharing.

[cass2sons]

Where can you get pine pellets? Do they eat them? What happens if they do eat them?

Thanks

[pigsforlife]

I made a 1x2 grid corflute pan that sits at the end of each cage. It is filled with kiln-dried pine shavings and aspen. They do kick it out a bit, but to stop that I just have a cheap matt on top of the fleece at the edge of the tray that I shake once a day and then put back in. I use a cat litter scooper to clean out the soiled bits a couple of times a day.

[gooberific]

I'm excited! I found these Long Bin/Divid/Lid White set/2 : Target at my local target, in singles, and it fits perfectly in the 1x2 kitchen area!! Now I only have one thing to pull out and clean and I can get rid of my ugly-looking, heavy vinyl tiles!

[cass2sons]

That's great, did you just take the lids off?

[gooberific]

the lid is separate and the divider is just an option, just filling it with carefresh!