ACADEMI Animal Bedding is one of Ireland’s most trusted bedding companies. Their newest addition to the range is Green Mile cardboard bedding, which the Co Longford business now supplies to top-level clients including Aidan O’Brien and Gordon Elliott.

According to Academi CEO Mark Cadam, the benefits of Green Mile cardboard bedding includes robust scientific testing, which has been carried out by researcher Susan Raymond of the Equine Research Centre in Guelph, Canada.

Raymond compared straw, shavings, peat moss, hemp fibres and shredded paper in her bedding absorbency test. When water was added to 10 grams of each bedding material, shredded paper came out the clear winner. Absorbing 100ml, as compared to hemp (45ml), shavings (30ml), and peat moss (30ml). The most traditional bedding, straw, was the least absorbent of the samples, soaking up only 25ml of water.

Green Mile Cardboard Bedding has a number of features you won’t necessarily find in other types of horse bedding including containing almost no dust, so is especially useful with horses with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD). The natural oils found in wood pulp can dramatically reduce the amount of ammonia, which builds up in stables. That’s good for the horses and for human health too.

100% biodegradable

This uniquely designed cardboard bedding is also 100% biodegradable, muck heap management is a concern for any owner today and dispersal can be difficult. Gone are the days when the farmer would happily take away the heap for free – some farmers charge for removal, but many have now decided to refuse muck heaps that consist of wood shavings due to the impact rotting shavings makes on the land, with the complete breakdown taking so long it affects the pH balance in the soil.

Green Mile Cardboard Bedding rots down completely within eight to 12 weeks, the soiled bedding can even be spread immediately onto the land. This benefits the land by introducing fibre back into the soil preventing “runoff” and “soil loss”, both major contributing processes to soil degradation.

Any moisture or liquid easily finds its way to the bottom layers of this useful bedding, is absorbed at a high rate, leaving the top layers nice and dry and stops the saturated areas from spreading throughout the rest of the bed. All moisture is contained in a very small amount of bedding, which then requires removing and replacing with the same small amount of fresh material.

Respiratory health

More absorbent bedding such as this can reduce the levels of moisture (which promotes mould growth) and ammonia in the stable, helping improve the respiratory health of your horses.

Absorbent beddings also tend to be less dusty and easier to muck out. Soiled bedding clumps together, aiding removal and perhaps allowing less bedding to be used overall.

Cardboard bedding allows your horse to rest in a lovely warm comfortable bed. The heat created by your horses quickly dissipates when they are sleeping, especially during the winter months, even when they are kept indoors. Cardboard uses its insulating properties by trapping the warm air created from your horse or animal between its corrugations of paper. This keeps the bed nice and cosy, perfect for those that bring their animals in at night be it horses or cattle or alpacas.

The source of cardboard Green Mile offers is also very important. All our raw material comes from a box manufacturer’s production line. New cardboard purchased only a few weeks before it was used for converting into boxes or packaging. By using new cardboard, we can guarantee it being free from contamination, such as food or chemicals. Also, there is no risk of wet and potentially mouldy cardboard entering the production line, thus eliminating the risk of spores or other irritations to an animal’s airway.

Green Mile cardboard bedding is a competitively priced bedding when compared to shavings and other types of bedding - whether we like it or not, affordability is a factor when we are choosing bedding. Green Mile can be bought in individual bales or pallets and delivered to your yard by the Academi team. Contact Academi for pricing and delivery.