EVERY dairy farmer knows what it is like to sniff and wheeze because of the dust in calving yards or at shows.
Specks from wood chips and rice hulls affect not only humans. They block calves' airways after birth and cause wound infection.
But Rocco and Daniel Felice have a solution - cardboard chips.
Nine months ago, the father and son team started Eco Animal Bedding, making bedding for stalls and yards from cardboard.
Previously in the document destruction business, they would end up with piles of cardboard that had no use.
Research showed that cardboard has been used in Europe for animal bedding for 20 years, as well as in the US.
Mr Felice said Australia was beginning to run out of these materials as well, because of the drought, and there was a market for an environmentally friendly alternative.
"This will be the future," he said.
"It is really hard to get the other stuff now. In two, three, four, five years, this will be the type of bedding. It will be what people use."
The alternative bedding comes in 20kg bales of 2.5cm cardboard chips.
Mr Felice said it took about three bags to fill a 12 metre by 12 metre stable.
The bales cost $16.60 each.
Each cardboard chip soaks up to "three times its weight" and lasts longer than other products on the market, according to Mr Felice.
In horse stables, the bedding has been re-used.
"Pick it up with a fork, hit it against the wall," he said.
"It breaks apart and there is no ammonia smell."
The chips have been made from cardboard waste from cardboard makers and white goods manufacturers.
The large sheets are run through a machine that chops it into pieces and extracts the dust.
Mr Felice ensured all the cardboard was "food grade", in case any animals decided to chomp on it while in the stall.
The East Keilor business is in the process of setting up distributors across the country.
Meanwhile, customers outside Melbourne, Sydney, Adelaide and Western Australia can order the eco bedding and have it delivered straight to their door.
