What Are Coco Husk Chips?
Coco Husk is a natural, sustainable, and eco-friendly material that is very popular to be used as a reptile bedding and in home gardens. It is the middle fibrous coat (Pith) that protects the hard seed coat and coconut flesh we all love. Coco Husk is known by many names, including Coco Peat, Coco Pith, Coconut Fiber etc.
The average coconut tree produces approximately 150 coconuts annually. Coconut Husk uses the parts of the fruit that used to go to waste.
It can hold up to 10x its weight in water. Helping keep a terrarium humid, or slowly release water back to plants in a garden.
What Makes Our Coco Husk Chips Better?
We triple washed our Coco Husk in fresh water to eliminate unwanted debri such as stones and plastics. This also greatly reduces the sodium content in the final product. This is important for the long term well being of your plants and animals.
Traditionally most coco husk you find is either washed with sea water adding more sodium to the product, or likely washed not at all. – If you find stones in your coco husk it wasn’t washed!
This process alls removes all the dust and long loose fibers. Meaning, you’re only paying for a premium product and not a bunch of waste.
Using Coco Husk Chips In A Terrarium
Coconut Husk Chips helps maintain proper humidity levels in a reptile habitat and is easy to spot clean. Due to the Antimicrobial and Antibacterial properties of Coconut Husk, it will also help trap and contain unwanted odors from animal waste compared to other popular substrates.
Our Coco Husk is triple washed, to eliminate dust, and reduce the sodium content remaining in the coco husk. This means you and your pets won’t be exposed to fine, irritating dust or have to worry about salt build up in your enclosures. It has also been screened to remove unwanted coco fibers, debris, sand and rocks. Making this terrarium substrate, the top choice for reptile breeders and keepers with the highest standards.
When appropriate, you may add Isopods and Springtails to your reptile habitat to help make a bioactive substrate for your pets. This will help extend the usable life of your substrates as these little critters will eat the decomposing bio-matter, sheds, and animal waste.
Using Coco Husk In A Garden
Home gardeners have been using Coconut Husk as a soil amendment and as a mulch in their gardens. Mixing Coco Husk into your garden beds helps retain moisture in the soil, to be used by plants later. The fibers of the Coconut Husk help break up the soil and improve aeration to the roots. Supporting healthy, strong plant growth. You may use the Coco Husk as a top dressing mulch to suppress weeds and retain moisture for your flower beds and bedding plants.
How To Expand A Coco Husk Brick
You can use Coco Husk either dry or wet, depending on your reptile or garden needs. Simply add water and watch the brick expand. (warm water works best!)
Each brick will expand to approximately 5-7 liters of loose chips.
One of the easiest way to expand the brick is to place it into a large plastic tote, filled with water. Submerge the entire brick for approx 30-60 seconds, then flip and repeat. This will allow the coco husk to absorb some water and start the break apart. Place the now wet block into another tote or bucket and allow it to expand.
Once the brick is expanded you should be able to easily pull apart the block. Add more water if required. If you find the substrate to be too wet, you can squeeze out any excess water. At this point it is ready to use in your reptiles habitat or in your garden.
Dispose of your used and soiled coco husk in a backyard or city composting program (Green Bin). We recommend freezing used coco husk before adding it to your garden to eliminate any unwanted pathogens or microbes.
You may also blend Coco Husk with other substrates such as Coco Coir,Cypress Mulch or Fir Bark to make your own custom substrate for reptiles or even potted plants.
Reptiscape Coco Husk is available for sale and shipping in Canada only.
