new to chicken farming again

DJoe

Chirping
5 Years
Apr 18, 2016
11
0
70
Hi it's me again, DJoe...back with some important questions. We decided to refurbish our old coop. It has been left unused and was never cleaned out 25 years ago after the heart break of a predator attack that left all our chickens dead. That old coop has been totally ignored as it was quite a ways from the house and not visible from the house. We've moved it close to the house and are doing a thorough cleaning and repair of the building. It is a large building about 16×20 and will make a roomy home for the few chickens we plan to start with. I've ordered 16 chicks. The brooder is ready for them in another building. My questions: 1) what can be safely used to disinfect the bare wood inside the coop after carefully cleaning all surfaces as much as possible. 2). I've read on this site about people willing to give free pine shavings for litter. Where do I find such generous people? We live in the Pacific North West and it seems like all wood products come at a premium price. 3) my hubby thinks it's okay just to have the bare wood floor. I personally don't want to have the job of cleaning that bare wood again if at all possible to avoid it. Please advise.

our chickens will be much better protected this time round to be sure. No more free rangers for me which I find sad but living meet to a year round stream where many predator creatures live there is no other way.

THANKS SO MUCH FOR YOUR TIME AND ANSWERS!

dJoe
 
You can use vinager or watered down bleach to dissinfect the walls, and after they dry I would paint them with exterior grade paint- it makes a spring scrub-down much easier.

I have no clue about free shavings, although I wouldn't by them at a pet store. The bags are tiny and the prices are huge. I buy a condensed bag at my local feed store for about $8.00. I think it expands to eight cubic feet.

I have linolium on the floor and would not want bare wood- cecal poops turn into cement. Trying to get that off of bare wood? No, thankyou! You can also use blackjack 40, a lot of people do. I haven't evver tried it. You paint it onto the floor. I assume that because you are getting sixteen birds to start with, you won't be poop boarding, and if you want to cut down on shavings costs, here's a link to a DLM thread: https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/70/deep-litter-method
 
Thanks so much for the reply...very helpful! Could someone please tell me about "poop boards". Not a concept I'm familiar with except to read it over and over on this site. Haven't seen an explanation though. Thanks
 
Poop boards are boards under the roost wide enough to catch poop during the night, about a foot to either side of the roost. Poop boards are usually two to three feet off the ground, with the roosts being six to twelve + inches above it. Poop boards are usually for smaller flocks, since they require you to clean them every morning or every other morning, a chore that grows with the number of poopers. ;)

Poop boards can either have a lip and be filled with sweet PDZ, or be just a board and scraped off. If it is filled with sweet PDZ (granulated PDZ, mind) and sand, the poop is dried out and doesn't stink. It is scooped out with a fiine litter scoop. If the board is just a board, than it can get kinda gross, but the poop is scraped off into a bucket and there is no extra dust. The poop from either board should go into the compost.

The space under the poop board can be used for a variety of purposes, or just as coop space. Some people put nesting boxes under their poop board, or fence it off into an integration safe room. I keep my feeder under the poop board. You could use it as storage or a broody/brooder room too.

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/621363/poop-board-convert-warning-graphic-gross-poop-pictures
 
I thought about adding a poop board to my coop but it is only 30"x48" for 4 girls. I'm thinking once they start roosting just take the shavings out and switch to PDZ.
 
Thanks again for your timely reply. I'm learning so much just reading through lots of posts. Please advise ie. What is "sweet pdz? I'm really liking the idea of placing Linoleum over the wood floor. Hubby decided both roof and floor need replacing. I'm thinking a good scrub down and then spray on disinfectant then a coat or two of Kilz then a good exterior scrubbable paint should just about take care of the interior. Then a new roof and paint on exterior and replace broken windows and we're good to go. Lol. My poor hubby gets stuck with the worst of it because of back issues for me. He's working so hard at it all and I'm the one who wanted to have chickens again. We both enjoyed having them for many years before though and look forward to enjoying chicken life again.

Thanks again for all you do to help and inform.

Djoe
 

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