# Substrate choices.



## Greenling (Jan 22, 2016)

So I plan on keeping my mice as cheap as possible. And one of the things I heard about was Yesterday's News. The benefit of me buying this vs care fresh is its cheaper, its not dusty, it won't get tossed around and it is absorbent. ( Mice smell but minimizing it helps.) The other reason for it. I have a cat and this stuff is cleaner than clay. I have to dust my floors daily so if this can stop it and smell better I am all for it!.


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## Laigaie (Mar 7, 2011)

Carefresh and other paper beddings are expensive and barely help. Try Sani-Chips if you're in the US, or aspen shreds.


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## micurious (Nov 7, 2015)

After poking around the forum for a while I settled on corn cob bedding. So far it works for me. It seems to absorb very well, I haven't noticed any particular grossness.


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## raisin (Sep 22, 2014)

Shredded newspaper is the cheapest thing I can think of. It can also help with smell if you tap in a little baking soda I suppose.
I like it since the mice nest with it.


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## PaasosEden (Aug 18, 2016)

How often do you have to clean the shredded paper raisin?


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## Torin (May 18, 2016)

Buying substrate marketed for horses and/or game birds is substantially cheaper than buying similar products aimed at the pet market. You do have to have the space to store larger bales or sacks though.


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## Lilly (Nov 21, 2015)

I find newspaper/yesterday's news/carefresh all very bad as a bedding choice for anything other than one or two does when its changed every few days. Wet newspaper just smells and all the other paper bedding seems to be very bad at odor compared to aspen and a lot more expensive.

Buying big bags aimed at horse bedding would likely be cheaper but for $14 I get a big bag of aspen shavings from petsmart, I have not found it dusty at all and my hairless are perfectly fine on it even with their sensitivities and it lasts me a couple of months (with 13 bins of varying sizes)


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## FlufferNutter (May 6, 2016)

I have to throw my lot in with shredded newspaper for the best cheapest option, especially if you have access to a proper shredder. It does smell when wet, but it is practically free so you can use it very liberally, which stops it from getting too wet.

P.s. When I was using shredded newspaper I cleaned out once every two weeks, and would sometimes add fresh handfuls in between clean outs, and it was fine.


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## raisin (Sep 22, 2014)

I usually cleaned my shredded newspaper every week. I put in a good 2-3 inches, shredded with a mechanical shredder. I also would lay down a whole, flat sheet of newspaper on the bottom underneath shreddings for ease of cleaning (just roll it all up into a poo-poo burrito).

I never let it get "wet" - that's too long in between cleanings in my opinion. And I found if I waited too long to clean, my mice would get agitated and start having spats.

For just females, newspaper is not smelly. For males, everything is smelly and there's not much to be done.


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