If you happen to have a critter who gets bed sores, there is only one way to prevent them or get rid of them: you have to pad the bony parts. If the animal only gets sores on the hocks, which is most common, you can use special padded wraps or you can provide deep bedding. One way or another, the only solution to bed sores is a lot of padding.
If you have a creature like Prince Ramsey, who gets bed sores on his hocks, knees, elbows, stifles, hips AND above his eyes, the only option is lots and lots of deep bedding.
Ramsey got his first bed sores on his knees about an hour after he was born and we have battled them ever since. I had hoped that he would eventually toughen up and grow out of them, but no such luck. His Majesty is why there is always bedding my barn.
The best bedding for bed sores is a deep layer of hay and/or straw. There is only one problem with this for my herd, who are all on perpetual diets - they have taken to eating all the bedding. So, I have been experimenting with other options.
I have tried pelleted bedding that I soak first. The pellets break down into sawdust when soaked in water....
That is three bags of pellets and several buckets of water. The chicken is purely gratuitous, she was not helpful to this endeavor.
The pellets work well while they are fresh, but they dry out quickly and become extremely dusty. They still work OK if they are very, very deep, but tend to keep breaking down into finer and finer particles and if they get thin, they actually make the sores worse. They act like sandpaper unless you can keep them 4-6 inches deep. In an open barn like mine, that is very difficult. I tried putting some old hay in there as well and you can see how well that worked...
I have just started adding shavings on top of the pellets and that is working better for now. The combination packs in better than either alone, but I can see where they too will be very dusty and need frequent refills. I'd rather not have to use any bedding in the barn because of all the dust, but I can't have Prince Ramsey being a bloody mess.
I am still looking for something that works as well as a nice bed of straw, that is not dusty, won't cause bankruptcy and won't get eaten. It is a work in progress. We wouldn't want the Prince to be feeling all those peas after all.
