DLM vs Sand

[kirstenchickenlady]

Hello to all the backyard chicken fanatics! I have been bugging my friend lately about my chickens, she doesn’t like them and it grosses her out that we have them (she’s kinda weird lol).

So I just converted my coop and run to have sand as the litter and bedding. I’m curious what everyone thinks about sand. I was thinking on the DLM but I’m not sure how I feel about it. I might try the DLM one day.

What are your thoughts? Any pros and cons for either of them? Some pics of my before and after so you guys can check it out!

I have some pros for sand:

Drains well
Lower risk of bacterial and parasitic infections
Minimal dust
Easy to clean (sift the poop out of the sand once a month)
Affordable (only change out once a year)
Provides grit for chickens
Chickens love dust bathing in it too


Cheers to healthier chickens and healthier living .

 

[aart]

DLM or semi deep litter is far superior to sand in a run in most climates ....unless you like sifting poops.
Biggest con, is you never get all the poops up and eventually it will reek.
Those rocks might be even harder to 'clean'.
JMHO....others love sand.

 

[kirstenchickenlady]

DLM or semi deep litter is far superior to sand in a run in most climates ....unless you like sifting poops.
Biggest con, is you never get all the poops up and eventually it will reek.
Those rocks might be even harder to 'clean'.
JMHO....others love sand.

I don’t think I have enough chicken poop to compost ratio for the DLM

For not eventually getting all the poops, rotatilling and rinsing down and adding a little top layer of sand to freshen it. Eventually removing it and replacing with a fresh sand layer. If I spray it down, it will just decompose in the earth underneath as well.

 

[3KillerBs]

If I spray it down, it will just decompose in the earth underneath as well.

Without sufficient carbon to interact with the high-nitrogen poop it rots rather than composts. Eventually the soil becomes so loaded with decay products that it can't handle any more. This happened to cemeteries in London in the Victorian era.

How fast this happens will depend on the nature of your soil -- how much organic material it has, how porous it is, how much moisture is available, etc. -- and the nature of your climate -- dry or wet, cool or warm.

 

[aart]

I don’t think I have enough chicken poop to compost ratio for the DLM

That's not a problem.
Having too much carbon is not a problem...too much poop might be.
That's why you go semi deep, just a couple inches of wood chippings and some other dry plant matter will kill the stink almost immediately.
I never 'clean' my run, just add a bit more stuff once in awhile.

 

[crowber]

I'm new to chickens, but I'm liking the deep litter method so far. In fact, reading about the DLM was what finally pushed me over the edge to get chickens. Because I knew I'd be a lazy chicken keeper. I have hemp in the coop and wood shavings/straw in the run. 4 chickens. The coop just smells like hemp. I figured out that to work well, there should be enough debris on the ground to be "fluffy". Then the hens keep busy digging and stirring it up. There's so much stuff for them to search through, they can scratch to their hearts' content. They're over 3 months old now and they have practically their whole lives' worth of poop in there because when I cleaned their brooder I just dumped the shavings in the run. The coop itself you can barely tell there's any poop in there and I've never removed it. I suspect that when people failed the DLM, they either didn't have minimum square footage for the number of chickens they had, insufficient ventilation, or they didn't have enough organic matter deep enough. Because so far it's working great for me.

 

[aart]

They're over 3 months old now and they have practically their whole lives' worth of poop in there because when I cleaned their brooder I just dumped the shavings in the run.

Do you know that their poops will triple(or more) in size once they start laying?
It's one of the those little fun facts about keeping chickens that astounds many(including me).