Deep litter method

[RoseMarie1]

Bagged up 8 lawn & leaf trash bags worth of dry leaves today. DH and I have it down to a fine science. We take a leaf blower and get them all in one spot. He then takes the mulching push mower with a grass catching bag on the back and runs over them. Two full grass catching bags = one lawn & leaf bag of leaves. Threw the filled bags in the old coop to store them until the girls need them. That should hold them for a while.

And not a moment too soon as it began to pour rain a few hours after we were done. Whew!

WOW and that would help them break down better to. I was noticing today I need to get more for under mines roost. It's getting really thin looking again. I can't get over how fast it's breaking down now so I must have some good bugs in there now. I was out there this evening messing around because it was nice out and the wind wasn't gusting. Got a bunch of leaves raked up and raked them right on over into the run. Two huge piles that were just right there close to the door. The leaves and pine straw is falling like mad and I am just plum giddy.

Makes my day especially when I feel like raking it up and tossing it in their pen. It rained yesterday so that settled the dust for me to so it wouldn't mess me up with these sinuses. It's still misting rain and I am hoping on Monday I can put my mask on and use my sweeper and sweep them all up since the rain has settled the dust. I'll just sweep em up and pile em at the door of the coop.

 

[frostbite]

I decided to try the deep litter method, and now, a year later, I can tell you that it works GREAT in Alaska, but not the way I thought...

Start out in April with a clean coop, put your spruce shavings in there with your chicks, and let 'er rip!

Add more shavings as needed, throw in some scratch and some darkling beetles to get them mixing it up, and you can make it a few more months.

Long about October, the whole works pretty much freezes. Frozen poop doesn't smell at all, and it grows like stalagmites under the roosts. You can grab the stalagmites with your gloved hands and lift them out of the coop like great chunks of firewood, and throw them in your compost bin with the rest of the frozen stuff in there, every once in a while, when the stalagmites get too tall and start to impede movement around the coop.

You can get along this way for about seven months. Stays nicely frozen and smell free. Add a little more shavings every now and then for the insulation value.

Then around mid April, when the place starts warming up to 30 degrees with fair frequency, you start to notice the whole thing is starting to melt, and therefore starts casting off the odor you've been missing all those long months. Now is the time to kick the chickens out of the coop, scrape the darn thing clean, fill the rest of your compost bin, or spread it on the lawn so it will start to attract flies. Gives the chickens something to do when they're free ranging. The yard only smells bad the first couple days....

Right now, we're back to the "growing stagmites" stage....

 

[Beekissed]

Why not just amend it in the spring with a light layer of sweet lime to keep the smell down, add some ventilation and some dry bedding on top of that and continue the DL in place? Sounds like it only smells due to moisture and moisture can be corrected pretty easily. Taking some off the bottom layer for the garden and leaving some in place to inoculate the new litter would be a good thing but I wouldn't clean it out all the way or you lose your good culture that you had going on.

Those poopamites and tites sound pretty awesome...could you take a pic next time?

 

[frostbite]

I will try to get pics...may take a few months....

 

[gilcamp4]

Why not just amend it in the spring with a light layer of sweet lime to keep the smell down, add some ventilation and some dry bedding on top of that and continue the DL in place? Sounds like it only smells due to moisture and moisture can be corrected pretty easily. Taking some off the bottom layer for the garden and leaving some in place to inoculate the new litter would be a good thing but I wouldn't clean it out all the way or you lose your good culture that you had going on.

Those poopamites and tites sound pretty awesome...could you take a pic next time?

I do it that way, works great, the only thing is this year we saw mold on the roof so we pulled the whole thing apart thought we were going to have to make a new coop, but it was only in the corner the rest was clean but we washed the whole thing real clean and left it set for 2 days then redid it, we do use a camper for a coop, put all new chips and hay in it, now they are back in they love it in there and we have two peeps that will not leave the coop we were putting corn in coop for them but this week one day I put it on the steps they came out and ate it then yesterday we just put it in the yard they came out and got some but ran right back in, they never come out and walk around the yard, I tried locking them out but they just sat on the step,

 

[RoseMarie1]

I added many more piles to my run today. I put my mask on and swept it up with the sweeper and it must have been at least 8 sweeper things full of it. Now it's almost to the top of the stumps sitting in there. lol I really didn't spread it out well was going to let them do it for me since I wore myself out scooping it in the door.

Got too hot and started coughing so I said OK Rose it's time to quit and go in the house. So I shouldn't have to put any in there now for a little while.

 

[gilcamp4]

I added many more piles to my run today. I put my mask on and swept it up with the sweeper and it must have been at least 8 sweeper things full of it. Now it's almost to the top of the stumps sitting in there. lol I really didn't spread it out well was going to let them do it for me since I wore myself out scooping it in the door.

Got too hot and started coughing so I said OK Rose it's time to quit and go in the house. So I shouldn't have to put any in there now for a little while.

it is a waste of your time to do it they just come along and spread it the way they want it anyway, I did that with the chips in coop last week looked so nice and neat, went in today and it was all pushed in a ball in front of the door so I just kicked it out of the doorway.
tomorrow they will have it right back there again

 

[RoseMarie1]

it is a waste of your time to do it they just come along and spread it the way they want it anyway, I did that with the chips in coop last week looked so nice and neat, went in today and it was all pushed in a ball in front of the door so I just kicked it out of the doorway.
tomorrow they will have it right back there again

yep you so right. They keep it all stirred up, but that is a good thing.

 

[henless]

After reading the whole post, the DL method sounds like something I would like to try out. Seems like it would be a lot easier than cleaning out the pens on a daily/weekly basis.

I'm in the process of turning 2 stalls into a coop and covered pen and plan on using DL in them both.

 

[TheSpiceGirls]

I'm about 4 weeks into deep litter method. I only have 3 hens so not that much poop builds up. Although two of those hens are 8lb birds and they do make quite the pile at night. I've been stirring it up and so far it really just smells like pine shavings in there. I think I'll toss in some leaves to mix it up this weekend.

But I love not having to clean out the coop daily like when I had sand or weekly when I had just a little layer of shavings.