dry cough (human!) due to wood pellet bedding?!

kerilli

kerilli

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i've had my horses on wood pellet bedding for about 6 wks now, wetting it down well etc. quite pleased with absorbency etc.
both OH (who has been doing a lot of mucking out for me while i've been incapacitated with injured knee) and i have persistent dry coughs. neither of us had coughed this morning until i put a bag of pellets down in stable, raked them flat, soaked them... and we both started coughing...
horses not coughing at all but none in work at the moment (due to my knee) so no way of knowing if they might when worked...
anyone else with horses on this bedding got a persistent dry cough, or am i adding up 2 and 2 and getting 584?!!
thanks!
 
Used them since November and no cough for either myself, OH or YO, ditto the two horses.

I have not found them dusty - far less than normal shavings or chopped straw.

I have had a horrible cold and chest infection, ditto my OH but there are so many bugs around at the moment - maybe you have picked something up?
 
Er, don't like the sound of a dry cough much. Productive cough would say flu/bug to me but not a dry cough. Try wearing a builders dust mask when doing the bedding and see whether that affects your cough - that ought to give you an indication of whether the bedding causes it.
 
I would be agreeing with Kit. Sounds a bit like inhaling dust. Are you sure you can't see a thin layer of dust in the stables indicating that you are breathing that stuff in?
 
[ QUOTE ]
Er, don't like the sound of a dry cough much. Productive cough would say flu/bug to me but not a dry cough. Try wearing a builders dust mask when doing the bedding and see whether that affects your cough - that ought to give you an indication of whether the bedding causes it.

[/ QUOTE ]

thanks kit, that's exactly what i thought. i'll buy some dust masks tomorrow and do a week of using those all the time. if that cures it, i'm binning the woodpellet idea, don't want my horses with coughs!
 
I tried wood pellets (aquamax) and they made me cough, megazorb did also. I've just started with snowflake which is a less expensive version of easibed and it doesn't seem dusty at all and hasn't made me cough. Might be worth looking at.
 
Ah Kerilli - you should try cardboard bedding. I've heard it's very good....


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We used 5 star wood pellets for a while at work after I'd finished on the yard and gone into the office I could always feel it irritating my nose and throat. I don't have any problems at all with straw or hay and I keep my own horses on aquamax so it was definitely the 5 star causing it, and other staff said the same.
 
I also use pellets and dont have a cough. However I wet mine BEFORE I tip them into the bed. Open bag into wheelbarrow and pour over 3/4 bucket of warm water ( or make small hole in bag and poke hosepipe in), stand back for 5 minutes, tip in and rake round.
 
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