Considering the importance of litter in the poultry industry in Brazil and the enormous pressure on the environmental management regarding the correct use and management of waste generated by the productive sector, we sought to characterize different types of bedding used in the State of Minas Gerais. Aimed to analyze the effect of reuse on the sanitary quality of the beds, and verify if the optimal number of reuses, based on the sanitary point of view, is the same to make compost in the field indicated by studies conducted by Marin (2011). The research was conducted with 32 beds aviaries, checking the sanitary quality by identifying Escherichia coli and Salmonella spp. Coffee husk reduced about 29 percentage points in the probability of Salmonella occurrence when compared to wood shavings, and had no statistical differences between the cycles of reuse for each substrate. Escherichia coli was identified in all cycles of reuse for both substrate; in the wood shavings were found high levels of concentration in all cycles, while in the coffee husk, these levels only occurred after the second cycle. From the sanitary point of view, the best time to remove the bed of coffee hulls and wood shavings in the aviary occurs respectively at the end of the second and first cycles, coinciding with the results obtained by Marin (2011) to carry out the composting field.