Please help with cage bedding/cleaning!

[Luckii]

Our current cage and bedding is so much work and doesnt stay clean for much longer than 3-4 days before it needs a full cleaning again (even with spot cleans). My wife and I are struggling to find a relatively cheap solution to our problem. Paper is expensive but Im looking into getting huge bags of shredded paper from work (Im in the military and my base has a 100% paper shred policy). Im hoping that will be cheaper and easier to clean. This is pictures of me cleaning our current setup which I do every 3-4 days:


The tile underneath is our safety plan in case our A/C ever goes out. Thats never happened but we cant be too safe living in San Antonio with guineas.


(carrots in hay basket are leftover food I got out of the way while cleaning)


100% fleece liner on top of the towels.


Happy guineas - Not so happy furbaby parents.

We are looking for literally any other solution ideas. We dont have an excessive amount of time, energy or money on our hands as my wife works as well.

[Lynx]

Your little guinea pigs are adorable! I don't know that there are any easy solutions but a corner that has much more hay, perhaps with a lip to it, would end up being a place they would enjoy hanging out, eating hay, and peeing and pooping on it. You would perhaps dump the hay area once a day. Find an inexpensive source of high quality timothy horse hay and it won't cost all that much. Be aware that the hay will get tracked to the other areas.

[Luckii]

The problem my wife pointed out with doing something like that is that 2 of the pigs (the white and black in the back and the black and brown on the left) would just not come out to the corner because theyre not tame yet. They currently come out to the bowls at breakfast and dinner and grab veggies and drag them back to the beds in the back. They also poop and pee 90% of the time on those beds in the back. Also what do you think of our setup? Is it big enough? It's 16 square feet.

[bpatters]

Wood pellets are by far the cheapest bedding -- a 40 pound bag is about $6-$8. I have a 16 square foot cage, and it requires two bags. I'm at about 8-9 months on these, and am aiming for a year.

I put a layer of thin fleece on top to make it easier to dump the poop and the hay, and stir the pellets when needed.

[mmeadow]

That's a nice size cage for your lucky little herd! Those extra layers where they make the most mess can be swapped out often, so you don't have to clean the whole place.

I have recently been very happy using large compressed bags of shredded paper (like this from Kaytee). I find that it goes a long way and does a great job of absorbing liquid. It costs less than Carefresh, and isn't the hassle of fleece. You would need to put a lip on the cage or it'd be all over the floor.

[RavenShade]

What you might consider is making that bed area in the back a "kitchen" with carefresh or whatever to minimize the cleaning outside of that area. What I do with my fleece setup is to take a small broom and dustpan and sweep out the poop and old food/hay when I feed them at night. I keep a small trash can in their room and I (well, my daughter does) take it out to the compost when it is full. We roll up the fleece and underbedding (a UHaul blanket, the grey kind you can get in a 3 pack) and shake it out/wash it weekly (or as needed) and replace. Do you think that might be easier for you?

I would avoid newsprint - it's not very effective and smells quickly in my experience. You also don't want ink they may get sick from on any paper you use.

I like your setup - you have the hay nicely spaced out and you have multiple feeding spots so that no one pig can guard the food and prevent all the others from eating.

[TheCageCleaner]

We've been using fleece from the start and the thing that has worked the best for us is using smaller pads in certain areas on top of the main fleece. They don't have to be fancy, if you have a sewing machine just slap together a couple of layers of Uhaul or towel between two pieces of fleece and stitch. We put 2x1 pads under each hide and another one under their hay pile/bag/etc, and change/flip daily. Pigs will usually do most of their business by the hay pile or under their hides, so your main fleece liner should stay pretty clear and dry under the small pads.