Shepherd Speciality Papers

Shepherds offer a wide variety of Cage and Pan Liners, Bedding and environmental enrichment items for the best possible animal care and to make cage maintenance easier and more economical .

For more than 25 years, Shepherds Speciality Papers has been dedicated to producing and providing the highest quality products specifically for the animal care industry.

While others may offer look-alike products at competitive prices Shepherds will not cut corners to provide a lower-cost product at the expense of their quality standards.

Shepherds key product areas:

• Alpha-dri cellulose  bedding 

• Corncob bedding

• Enviro dri enrichment 

• Alpha Twist enrichment 

Our SSP Bedding Product Range

Simply the best bedding available of precisely defined composition and exceptional absorbency. 

Shepherd's™ ALPHA-dri®, made from alpha cellulose, is a loose animal bedding of exceptional absorbency and precisely defined composition

A  manufactured bedding that is absolutely defined, always consistent.

• Assured variable control Defined composition assures accurate control of variables, which makes ALPHA-dri® ideal for GLP research.

• Dust elimination - Sanitary and virtually dustless, ALPHA-dri® reduces cross contamination, filter clogging and problems of dust adherence to animals.

• Cost reduction - Approximately ten times as absorbent as wood chips, ALPHA-dri® does more with less material. What's more, its rapid evaporation means it stays dry longer. Since you need less material to do the same job, ALPHA-dri® reduces storage space and cuts maintenance time and labour.

• Improved animal observation - Bright, white colour aids in animal observation. Discharges and lab spills are readily noticeable.

• Static elimination - No static means no troublesome bridging in dispensing equipment.

• Availability - ALPHA-dri® is supplied in technical, irradiated, and individually batch-certified grades.

• Uniform Particle Size - ALPHA-dri® is manufactured with our strict quality control at our facility.

• Packaging - Both certified and technical grades are packaged in high strength autoclavable bags.

Can the Cleanest Bedding Material Also be the Most Economical?

The Answer is, Yes!

• ALPHA-dri® is comprised of pure, virgin paper cellulose which is virtually free of confounding contaminants. 

• For this reason, ALPHA-dri® is suitable to use right out of the bag for most studies.

• Bedding materials comprised of harvested by-products like corn cob and wood chips usually require autoclaving or irradiation treatments to reduce biological contaminants to acceptable levels.

• Contaminants like Mycotoxins and Endotoxins are still present in corn cob and wood bedding materials despite either sanitisation treatment.

• Autoclaving bedded cages can cost as much or more than the bedding itself.

• ALPHA-dri® absorbs 300% of its own weight which is 5 times more absorbent than some grades of corn cob.

• Superior absorbency means the quantity of bedding needed per cage can be significantly reduced.

"A New Twist in Our Bedding" The Premiere Rodent Enrichment Bedding and Nesting Material

ALPHA-twist™ is comprised of twisted multi-layered paper that is chopped into short lengths. Once in a cage, rodents unfurl and manipulate them into fluffy nests.

Features and Benefits:

• Maximum Environmental Enrichment: Species specific behaviours are nurtured and enhanced through the unrolling of the material for use in nest building. One roll of ALPHA-twist™ can be unrolled into a 5 inch strand of paper!

• Customised Dosage: Technicians can custom dose each cage with an exact amount of material to satisfy a particular cage or housing arrangement. Other cotton based nesting materials are pre-cut into individual doses which limit flexibility and cost reduction procedures.

• Economical: One bag of ALPHA-twist™ can provide enrichment for over 1400 standard cages. The cost per cage for exceptional enrichment is less than traditional cotton based nesting enrichment items.

• Safer to Use: ALPHA-twist is safer to use due to its low dust content and the absence of long cotton fibre strands eliminate strangulation issues.

ALPHA-twist™ is also offered pre-blended in our PLUS line of bedding materials:  ALPHA-dri PLUS® and Shepherd’s™Cob Plus™

Corn cob bedding has an extensive following in the Laboratory Research Industry and we are excited to offer the highest quality corn cob bedding available today.

• Superior Sanitation: Shepherd's™ Cob is dried in our driers to a lower moisture content than any other cob bedding material on the market. Our target moisture content during manufacturing is 5% by weight while other manufacturers dry their product to 8 to 10%. Lower moisture content means our processing more effectively kills bacteria, yeast, mould and coliforms. Please contact us for our most recent laboratory analysis.

• Excellent Absorbency: Lower moisture content means Shepherd's™ Cob will absorb more liquid by volume than other bedding materials

• Exceptional Ammonia Control: Corn cob bedding has been shown in several studies to control ammonia in micro-isolation caging better than wood and some recycled paper bedding materials

• Consistent Material: Shepherd's™ Cob is made from 100% natural corn cob with all foreign matter removed. It is biodegradable and easily incinerated.

• Available in Several Forms: Shepherd's™ Cob is available in our standard 1/4" and 1/8" grades in 10 kilogram poly-woven autoclavable bags as well as bulk sacks. We also offer both grades irradiated in 10 kilogram bags and bulk sacks.

Our SSP Enrichment Product Range

What makes a better nest?

• Biological relevance is a key component of environmental enrichment materials. 

• When mice are given appropriate nesting materials, they can build nests similar to  those built by their wild counterparts.

• Wild mice build dome-shaped complex,multilayered nests.

• Enviro-dri® allowed the mice to build the highest quality nests.

• Nests built with compressed cotton squares were of poor quality - even when multiple squares were used. 

• Enviro-dri® also provides an adaptive response to stressors in their environment.

Enviro-dri® Features

• Consistent quality: Enviro-dri® is a controlled, manufactured product made up of 100% virgin kraft paper fibres to ensure consistent, high quality. 

• Dust Elimination: Enviro-dri® is made of cleanly cut 1/8-inch strips of paper fibres, which means dust is virtually eliminated. Respiratory ailments and other problems resulting from competing compressed cotton squares are eliminated by using Enviro-dri®.

• Enhances Nest Building: Loose paper strands of paper cater to rodent's species specific behaviour of nest building.

• Eliminates Limb Entanglement: Cotton threads commonly found in competing compressed cotton squares, have been shown to cause limb entanglement problems with pups. Since Enviro-dri® is made of 100% paper, this health concern is eliminated.

• Availability: Enviro-dri is available in either natural or white grades both packaged in compressed 10 or 25 pound cartons.

• Easy disposal: Because Enviro-dri is a paper product, it can be incinerated for easy, economical disposal.

Introducing the revolutionary rodent enrichment product that has become an industry standard. Let your laboratory mice enjoy this revolutionary enrichment item. The Shepherd Shack comes in a variety of styles to suit every one of your mice. 

• Environmental enrichment: Shepherd Shacks’ provide an activity center for mice to climb on. They can also be chewed and shredded to build a nest.

• Reduced litter stress: Bedding can be easily changed in the area around the Shack without disturbing the litter inside.

• Reduced aggression: The Shepherd Shacks' caters to rodents' natural subterranean instincts. It can actually help reduce aberrant behavior of some of the more aggressive strains while offering mice a safe refuge from their more dominant cage mates.

• Increased surface area: In addition to the cage floor, the Shepherd Shacks' surface area may be counted as floor space.

• Superior Nest building device: Each Shepherd Shack forms an excellent foundation for nest building when combined with Enviro-dri® nesting material.   Mice pull the preferred quantity of nesting material into the shack to construct the perfect nest.

• Improved breeding environment: Early observations have shown improved breeding results for certain strains of transgenics and other types of mice.

• Availability:  It is available in five different shapes. The Shepherd Shack will fit in most cages currently on the market.

• Clean and Consistent: Manufactured from unprinted, uncoated white book publisher-grade paper, the Shepherd Shack is extremely clean and consistent.

• Autoclavable: It is easily autoclaved, and is available irradiated.

SAFE®

After a long-term strategic partnership with SAFE diets, the family enterprise of J. RETTENMAIER & SOHNE have united the core competences of both companies under the well-known and respected brand SAFE Complete Care Competence: all consumables and services around laboratory animal science from one manufacturer.

As the regional partner for SAFE® , Biological Associates can now offer all the benefits of their Complete Care Competence portfolio maintaining local inventory according to facility specific facility demand.

SAFE® key product areas:

• Aspen bedding and enrichment 

• Hydration and medicated Gels 

• Lab Animal Diets.  

Hydration and Medicated Gels

Safe® hydro - Instant fiber compound for the production of water gel

The innovative solution for a multitude of application possibilities for supplying water, food and drugs to animals. Produce your own water gel anywhere in a do-it-yourself and just-in-time fashion to suit your individual requirements.

Range of Gel diets

Range of SAFE® diets available

Contact Biological Associates on 1800 187 609 to discuss your specific needs.