Chicken run floor material

[boomercd]

I'm sure pea gravel would be great as drainage. In my case, I wanted to create compost for my gardens. I only use organic material in my run because I have an end goal in mind.

We tried just wood chippings lasted untill it rained a few times and the wood chips went out of sight. We do compost from the coop but gave in and put gravel on the run but it's been a very rainy Ohio winter. I Hope it works for you.

 

[Fluster Cluck Acres]

After the chickens rip up all the grass, and you put down wood chips, you should be set.

If you are into gardening, then I suggest continuing to add as much organic material to the chicken run and turning it into a chicken run composting system. I bag all my grass clippings and toss them into the run. The chickens love to eat some fresh greens, and the rest gets composted along with the wood chips, leaves, etc... All my yard leaves get composted in the chicken run. Nothing leaves my property.

I use paper shreds as deep bedding in the chicken run, and the paper shreds compost down in less than 3 months out in the chicken run. Almost any organic coop bedding could be used to make compost.

The chickens love to scratch and peck in my chicken run compost because it is full of bugs and worms. They could not be happier. In return, they continually mix the chicken run compost and help it break down even faster.

I tell people I have composting chickens and gets eggs as a bonus. In fact, I "save" more money on the compost from the chicken run than we get from selling eggs. In the past, I used to buy big store compost at about $6.00 per bag. Now I harvest the equivalent of hundreds of dollars of compost every year from my chicken run that I use in my gardens to grow people food. It's a pretty good system.

A good chicken run setup should not smell. If you put down a good layer of wood chips or go all out and make a chicken run composting system with grass clipping, leaves, etc..., the run should smell like a forest floor.

Can you tell me how you got started on this type of run bedding? My run is half sand (covered side) and pine pellets (uncovered side) which just turn to hard dirt/mud and need to be raked regularly. I love the idea behind the composting run, but am having trouble picturing how the conversion would go- will the system still work if I just start putting grass clippings in during the spring? I was also curious if it retains a lot of water. My run is half roofed and half open to the elements.

 

[Danedad]

After the chickens rip up all the grass, and you put down wood chips, you should be set.

If you are into gardening, then I suggest continuing to add as much organic material to the chicken run and turning it into a chicken run composting system. I bag all my grass clippings and toss them into the run. The chickens love to eat some fresh greens, and the rest gets composted along with the wood chips, leaves, etc... All my yard leaves get composted in the chicken run. Nothing leaves my property.

I use paper shreds as deep bedding in the chicken run, and the paper shreds compost down in less than 3 months out in the chicken run. Almost any organic coop bedding could be used to make compost.

The chickens love to scratch and peck in my chicken run compost because it is full of bugs and worms. They could not be happier. In return, they continually mix the chicken run compost and help it break down even faster.

I tell people I have composting chickens and gets eggs as a bonus. In fact, I "save" more money on the compost from the chicken run than we get from selling eggs. In the past, I used to buy big store compost at about $6.00 per bag. Now I harvest the equivalent of hundreds of dollars of compost every year from my chicken run that I use in my gardens to grow people food. It's a pretty good system.

A good chicken run setup should not smell. If you put down a good layer of wood chips or go all out and make a chicken run composting system with grass clipping, leaves, etc..., the run should smell like a forest floor.

thank you so much

 

[gtaus]

Can you tell me how you got started on this type of run bedding? My run is half sand (covered side) and pine pellets (uncovered side) which just turn to hard dirt/mud and need to be raked regularly. I love the idea behind the composting run, but am having trouble picturing how the conversion would go- will the system still work if I just start putting grass clippings in during the spring? I was also curious if it retains a lot of water. My run is half roofed and half open to the elements.

First of all, my run is completely uncovered (it has bird netting for protection, but no roof). If you want to make compost, you need to have the litter exposed to rain/water to help the process. If you have a covered portion of the run that you want to make compost in, you could probably spray it down with a garden hose every so often. The ideal is to have the compost litter about the moisture level of a wrung-out sponge. The top inch or so of the litter might be bone dry, but underneath it should have that wrung-out sponge consistency.

I started out my chicken run compost system with a base layer of wood chips over the dirt ground once the chickens ate all the grass. Then, in the spring, I started dumping my grass clippings in the run on top of the wood chips. You want to be sure not to dump the grass clippings in a big pile, because they will heat up and smell really bad. I spread out my grass clippings and/or put them in small enough piles that the chickens will spread them out as they scratch and peck through the grass clippings.

My chickens like to eat some fresh grass clippings. Because I have hawks and Bald Eagles overhead all the time, I cannot let my chickens free range for grass and other greens. So, I bring the free range to them in terms of fresh grass clippings.

When I pull weeds from the lawn or garden, they also get tossed into the chicken run. The chickens might eat some of the weeds, and the rest gets mixed into the litter to become compost.

In the fall, I mow up my leaves with the riding mower and dump the leaves in big piles in the chicken run. It does not take long for my chickens to spread out the leaves and make everything level on their own. Evidently, there are lots of good bugs in all those leaves because my chickens will be scratching and pecking like crazy in those piles of leaves.

As the chickens scratch and peck through everything in the run, they continually mix the litter which aids in breaking down the compost even faster. By the end of that first summer, I was able to harvest wheelbarrow loads of compost that I put on my gardens to winter over. Since then, I have so much compost ready to harvest that I have given some away to neighbors for their gardens in addition to having more compost than I can use myself.

I had so much compost to use that I built another 6 raised garden food beds to grow people food for the family. This spring, I plan on building another 4 new raised beds, filling it with hügelkultur wood on the base, and then putting about 8 inches in the top with topsoil and chicken run compost mixed 1:1. Makes great raised beds.

Of course, I now have enough compost to top off my existing raised beds with chicken run compost in both the spring and fall.

If I had to buy the compost in bags that I now harvest from my chicken run, it would cost me hundreds of dollars every spring and summer. That's why I tell people I have composting chickens and get eggs as a bonus. So, I now grow more people food than I ever did before thanks to my chicken run compost but no longer go broke buying big box store compost in bags.

My chicken run never smells. After a nice rain, it smells like a forest floor, which I like. If you ever have any bad odors in the chicken run, you need to add more carbons like wood chips or leaves. I used to worry about the grass clippings clumping up and smelling as they decay, but if your chickens spread everything around like mine do, then you will have no problem. The uneaten grass clippings will dry out and mix in with the litter, making great compost.

 

[Alagirl]

Let the chickens have fun eating & scratching the grass. After they kill it, put wood chips on the ground in the run. Exception, if the run gets all soggy & muddy before the grass is gone, put wood chips on top of the grass.

By "wood chips," I mean the kind that are produced when companies cut brush & chip it up, or sold for mulch. They are bigger and much thicker than the pine shavings that are sold for chicken bedding. The bigger size pieces work much better in chicken runs.

You can also add dry leaves in the fall, and various other things that might otherwise go in a compost pile at any season. But having plenty of wood chips in the mix can really help with keeping mud and smells under control.

definitely chips vs shavings.
I bought 'soil conditioner' pine bark chipped fine. It looked great for a few days, then the rain set in.
it conditioned the soil alright.
I am going to try pine bark mulch soon.

 

[gtaus]

I bought 'soil conditioner' pine bark chipped fine. It looked great for a few days, then the rain set in.

Depending on your setup, you might need at least a couple of inches of wood chips to start off with. The wood chips in direct contact with the bare dirt will compost faster than wood chips higher up off the ground.

Also, I am able to get free wood chips from our local county landfill. They charge the arborists to dump their wood chips at the landfill, but we can go there and load up as many wood chips as we want for free. Although I have a small electric wood chipper and a larger gas wood chipper at home, it would take me many, many hours to make the amount of wood chips I can load up in just 15 minutes into my trailer at the county landfill.

Some places have drop offs from local arborists from Chipdrop.com. The idea is that the arborist might be able to drop off a load of wood chips at your home rather than hauling them out to a landfill and having to pay to dump them there. So, it saves them money if they are in your area and can dump their load at your house. You would want to read the fine print on that agreement, because you don't have any say in the quantity, usually they dump their full load at your house. You could end up with a lot more wood chips then you need at the moment. But it's a service that works out for some people and worth checking into for your area.

Since I can free wood chips at our landfill, I would not pay anything for a Chipdrop load. But some places there might be a charge so you want to be sure if there are any costs. I suppose it would be worth it if you don't have access to free wood chips and/or you don't have a trailer to tow the load up the chips.

Knowledge is power. When I was first checking out wood chips in my local area, I found a wood working company that had huge piles of wood chips in their backyard. I asked them if I could load up my trailer with some chips. They said that would be fine at $60 for a trailer load. I passed on that deal and later that day I found out I could free wood chips at the landfill. Remember, the reason that company had a stockpile of wood chips in their backyard was because they would have to pay to dump those wood chips at the landfill. Trying to sell me those wood chips at $60 for a trailer full was just their way of trying to take advantage of my lack of knowledge, at that time.

 

[Alagirl]

Depending on your setup, you might need at least a couple of inches of wood chips to start off with. The wood chips in direct contact with the bare dirt will compost faster than wood chips higher up off the ground.

Also, I am able to get free wood chips from our local county landfill. They charge the arborists to dump their wood chips at the landfill, but we can go there and load up as many wood chips as we want for free. Although I have a small electric wood chipper and a larger gas wood chipper at home, it would take me many, many hours to make the amount of wood chips I can load up in just 15 minutes into my trailer at the county landfill.

Some places have drop offs from local arborists from Chipdrop.com. The idea is that the arborist might be able to drop off a load of wood chips at your home rather than hauling them out to a landfill and having to pay to dump them there. So, it saves them money if they are in your area and can dump their load at your house. You would want to read the fine print on that agreement, because you don't have any say in the quantity, usually they dump their full load at your house. You could end up with a lot more wood chips then you need at the moment. But it's a service that works out for some people and worth checking into for your area.

Since I can free wood chips at our landfill, I would not pay anything for a Chipdrop load. But some places there might be a charge so you want to be sure if there are any costs. I suppose it would be worth it if you don't have access to free wood chips and/or you don't have a trailer to tow the load up the chips.

Knowledge is power. When I was first checking out wood chips in my local area, I found a wood working company that had huge piles of wood chips in their backyard. I asked them if I could load up my trailer with some chips. They said that would be fine at $60 for a trailer load. I passed on that deal and later that day I found out I could free wood chips at the landfill. Remember, the reason that company had a stockpile of wood chips in their backyard was because they would have to pay to dump those wood chips at the landfill. Trying to sell me those wood chips at $60 for a trailer full was just their way of trying to take advantage of my lack of knowledge, at that time.

I need to look into it.
when the tree guys came by form the power company to mutilate my Hickory I was hoping they would dump the wood chips.
Turns out, while they carried the chipper along, they didn't use it.
A crew came by later to pick up the branches.
This is Alabama....
we don't do the logic thing.
They promised to bring me a load if they were in the vicinity, but since they just tow that chipper for looks....

If the pine nuggets last close to a year, that's fine. I need soil conditioning all over the backyard (and front yard.....)

 

[gtaus]

Turns out, while they carried the chipper along, they didn't use it.
A crew came by later to pick up the branches.

Doesn't make sense to me. Too bad. A missed opportunity for you but I hope you can find a free source of wood chips.

Although I have a smaller electric wood chipper (up to 1.5 inches) and a larger, more powerful gas chipper (up to 3 inches), I would not recommend investing in those wood chippers if you can find wood chips for free. I still use my wood chippers at home for lawn cleanup, but it takes a good amount of time to chip up wood at home. The people who sell you the chippers make it sound like it's no work at all. But I can load up my trailer full of free wood chips at the county landfill in 15 minutes that would take me about 10 hours of chipping wood at home.

Instead of chipping up my fallen branches, etc... lately I have been cutting them up with my recip saw or chainsaw and tossing them into my new hügelkultur raised garden beds. It's a better way for me to use up those branches then spending all that time chipping wood now that I have a source for free wood chips already chipped up. Sometimes I cut down a tree and have to burn out the stump. So, that is another good use of those branches. There are lots of ways to use up that wood and I have not hauled out any branches to the landfill in over 20 years. My goal is to keep and use all organic material on my property as best I can.

 

[The Birb King]

I would just leave it as grass they like to eat it. And dig wire a few feet underground so predators cant dig in.

 

[Folly's place]

All good advice here!
Drainage is very important; if your run doesn't have good run-off, fix the drainage issues so it's not the low spot in your yard. Standing water is bad, and will make any run a problem.
Wood chips and garden waste are terrific, as long as you are aware of what plants are toxic and avoid them. I wouldn't use chips that are mostly black walnut, or scraps from very toxic plants like Japanese yew, for example. And at least here we have recently been invaded by poison hemlock, and many people don't know what it looks like. Very bad news!
Birds may eat plants when confined with them that would be avoided when they free range and have lots of choices!
Mary