Harvesting my Chicken Run Compost - Black Gold!

[gtaus]

I love this chicken run composting idea! You have inspired me to do the same on our place.

Glad to hear this idea has value to you. I can attest to the fact the chicken run composting system is the best way of composting that I have used. The chickens do most of the work and they love it!

What do you think about cinder blocks being used as a border? I have always free roamed my chickens so building a run is new to me.

If you're going to build the run with wood, I think you're on the right track with cinder blocks to avoid ground contact with the wood. My run is just a fenced-in area, so I use metal T-posts and welded wire fence.

I just have 2X4 welded wire fencing on T-posts, as well. So, I am not too concerned about any wood rotting out. If you build a wooden frame for the chicken run, I would think the wood should be ground contact treated wood at a minimum. Putting the frame up on cinder blocks is probably an idea if you don't use treated wood.

If you use treated wood, and you are still concerned about how long the wood will last when in direct contact with active composting, then maybe you could line the inner fencing with a sacrificial scrap wood liner providing a barrier between the compost and the wood frame of your fencing. If/when the scrap wood liner falls apart, just replace it with some more leftover lumber.

I suspect the scrap wood liner itself would last for many years.

FWIW, I have some pallet wood bins where the wood is only heat treated, not ground contact treated, and the wood on those bins are over 5 years old and the wood is still fine. I'm sure ground contact treated wood will last even longer.

 

[gtaus]

I *wish* I could get free wood chips....the good/bad news around here is that they're in enough demand that people can charge for them. That's a bigger good, but a pain for me.

At least we can load up a trailer full of free wood chips at the local county landfill. So, that is one positive.

For the first 2 years with chickens, I used wood chips in both my chicken run and the coop. But the last 2 years I have switched over to using paper shreds in the coop, and when I clean out the coop and toss the paper shreds into the chicken run composting system, the paper shreds compost much faster than the wood chips. So, my use of wood chips has gone down a lot.

I have a couple of wood chippers at home. One is a small electric chipper which is good for up to 1-1/2 inches round and the other is a gas chipper which is good for up to 3 inch round branches. They are good for chipping up fallen branches, etc... around the house. But chipping wood at home with these small chippers takes a very long time.

I estimate it would take me about 10 hours to chip enough wood at home to fill my trailer whereas I can load out that same amount from the landfill in about 15-20 minutes.

 

[gtaus]

Is your run covered as well? Or do you not have aerial predators? That’s my concern and why I was building a wood frame with netting/roofing. I would love for there to be a way where it will just be a huge yard for them to enjoy.

I can tell you that my run setup is simply 2X4 welded wire fencing on T-posts and I have bird netting stretched over the top. I live on a lake, and we have hawks and Bald Eagles overhead all the time. The bird netting has prevented any aerial attacks for over 4 years that I have had chickens.

For composting in your chicken run, I prefer to have the run uncovered with bird netting so natural rain can get into the compost and keep it hydrated. If you build a covered run, you would have to wet down the compost every once in a while to keep it at that "wrung out sponge" consistency.

I have a large chicken run and bring the free range to them by collecting all my grass clippings in the mower bins. I also pull weeds and stuff from the garden and toss them into the chicken run. Kitchen scraps and leftovers all get tossed into the run. Just about anything organic goes into the run.

BTW, I suspect my chicken run compost has more worms and bugs in it than my yard where the chickens would be free ranging if I let them out. I don't think my chickens would be happier if given free range outside the run, and I know for a fact that they would probably not survive the summer. Just too much predation concerns where I live.

 

[Sally PB]

For composting in your chicken run, I prefer to have the run uncovered with bird netting so natural rain can get into the compost and keep it hydrated. If you build a covered run, you would have to wet down the compost every once in a while to keep it at that "wrung out sponge" consistency.

I have a solid roof over my run. Some rain/snow will blow in, but not enough for composting purposes.

At lock up, I empty out the chickens' water bowl inside the run, as long as the temp is above freezing. I don't want frozen ground in the run. When it's cold enough to freeze, I dump the water outside the run.

By dumping the water at night, it gets the chance to soak in so that the ground is just damp by morning. If it seems too dry even with that, I'll pour a gallon of water around in addition.

 

[LaylaJane]

I turned my chicken run into a chicken run composting system a couple years ago. I throw all my wood chips, grass clippings, leaves, weeds, spent coop bedding, and just about anything else organic into the run and let the chickens break it down and turn it into compost.

Here is a picture of my run with a large pile of grass clippings I just mowed this afternoon. I don't know if the picture is clear enough, but maybe you can see that in that mowing of grass I pulled up a lot of dead leaves from last fall, lots of dead brown material on the ground, and probably a fair amount of loose dirt got sucked up into those loads. Point is, my grass clippings are not just grass, which is why I was able to pile it so high. If all I had in the bins was grass clippings, then I would never pile them that high because the pure grass clippings would heat up and smell really bad. With all that brown material in the mix I don't have to worry about a stinky pile of grass matting up and going anaerobic.

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Here is a picture of the chicken run compost that I was harvesting from the chicken run today. Note that all my chickens were all right there "helping" me as I was forking out the litter into my compost sifter. I hope you can see how darker the lower layers of the compost is. That's black gold in book.

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Here is a picture of my cement mixer compost sifter. Notice all the screened, finished compost falls into the wagon below the wire on the barrel, and the unfinished compost and larger pieces fall out the end (where I have the blue muck bucket).

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The section of the chicken run I was harvesting today was about 1 year old. In the past, I was getting about 50% finished compost in the first wagon and 50% unfinished compost in the reject wagon. Today, I was getting about 90% finished compost and maybe only about 10% rejects. So, my sifting job was really going fast today - even with the "help" of all my chickens in the area that I was harvesting. BTW, my cement mixer compost sifter sifts out about 6 cubic feet of compost every 15 minutes. I used to buy my compost at the big box stores for about $5,00 per 2 cubic bag. Now I make my own compost and sift it out to the tune of about $60 worth of compost every hour of run time with my compost sifter. Saves me a lot of money.

This year, I have built a few more 4X4 foot galvanized steel panel raised hügelkultur beds. I mix the chicken run compost 1:1 with good Red River topsoil I purchased from a local nursery. That 1:1 mix goes on the top 6-8 inches of my raised beds. Here is one of the raised beds I finished filling up today.

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I will be planting peppers in this raised bed this weekend. Where I live, our average last frost date is the end of May, so I'm right on time with my projects.

Love talking about my chicken run composting and gardening projects. Willing to answer any questions you may have, or look forward to comments and pictures of your setups. Thanks for any feedback.

 

[Red-Stars-in-RI]

Was set up at Revive the Roots Seed Exchange event today in Smithfield, RI doing a little compost demo with some of my chicken run compost.

Had a table set up with inputs, different stages of compost decomposition, and my wheelbarrow and sifter. A few people got their hands dirty, a lot asked lots of good questions.

During the event, I ended up sifting a couple of wheel barrows worth of compost, which got donated to the organization for use right in some of their garden beds.

 

[LaylaJane]

Was set up at Revive the Roots Seed Exchange event today in Smithfield, RI doing a little compost demo with some of my chicken run compost.

Had a table set up with inputs, different stages of compost decomposition, and my wheelbarrow and sifter. A few people got their hands dirty, a lot asked lots of good questions.

During the event, I ended up sifting a couple of wheel barrows worth of compost, which got donated to the organization for use right in some of their garden beds.

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This is absolutely awesome! I love to compost! I feel like it makes my garden veggies taste so much better and the more work I put into it, the better they taste lol! Thank you for the pics and the time it took to educate others! I'm sure this was very much appreciated!

 

[Red-Stars-in-RI]

This is absolutely awesome! I love to compost! I feel like it makes my garden veggies taste so much better and the more work I put into it, the better they taste lol! Thank you for the pics and the time it took to educate others! I'm sure this was very much appreciated!

It was a good time and I enjoyed helping them out and talking to people about composting. Yes, compost may be a bit of work, but I don't have to go to the gym when I'm doing a lot of turning, hauling, sifting, and applying of compost!

 

[gtaus]

Had a table set up with inputs, different stages of compost decomposition, and my wheelbarrow and sifter.

That is an awesome setup. Very well done. Very informational. Looks like a perfect demonstration for anybody getting into composting.

Yes, compost may be a bit of work, but I don't have to go to the gym when I'm doing a lot of turning, hauling, sifting, and applying of compost!

I love how you used the wire frame on the wheelbarrow to show people how easy it is to get into shifting your compost. I did that for years and years. It works.

But, like I have said many times, when I converted my chicken run into a chicken run composting system, I had way too much compost material to shift manually. So, I made my cement mixer compost sifter. It's a real labor saver. In only 15 minutes, I can now sift as much compost as it used to take me a few hours with the manual sifting frame on the wheelbarrow.

And, of course, the 4-wheeled carts are much easier on the back than a one-wheeled wheelbarrow.

Somewhere along the way, I discovered that I could make and sift much more compost using these tools than doing everything manually. For me, it has meant I can enjoy this composting process for maybe another 10-15 years without beating up my back and body. Also, because I can make so much more compost with so much less labor, I have increased my gardening square footage more than 2X in the last few years. And, I will be adding yet more raised beds this year! I could have never considered that if I had continued to do everything manually.

I'm less worried about having to go to a gym for a good workout than staying out of the hospital for a bad back from all the composting I now do!

 

[LaylaJane]

That is an awesome setup. Very well done. Very informational. Looks like a perfect demonstration for anybody getting into composting.



I love how you used the wire frame on the wheelbarrow to show people how easy it is to get into shifting your compost. I did that for years and years. It works.

But, like I have said many times, when I converted my chicken run into a chicken run composting system, I had way too much compost material to shift manually. So, I made my cement mixer compost sifter. It's a real labor saver. In only 15 minutes, I can now sift as much compost as it used to take me a few hours with the manual sifting frame on the wheelbarrow.

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And, of course, the 4-wheeled carts are much easier on the back than a one-wheeled wheelbarrow.

Somewhere along the way, I discovered that I could make and sift much more compost using these tools than doing everything manually. For me, it has meant I can enjoy this composting process for maybe another 10-15 years without beating up my back and body. Also, because I can make so much more compost with so much less labor, I have increased my gardening square footage more than 2X in the last few years. And, I will be adding yet more raised beds this year! I could have never considered that if I had continued to do everything manually.

I'm less worried about having to go to a gym for a good workout than staying out of the hospital for a bad back from all the composting I now do!

I looked at that wagon and then at mine and thought.... I could put a catch box in the wagon and a sifting tray 6 inches deep resting on the top n sift while I mow my yard LOL And just saying that out loud made me feel lazy and brilliant all at the same time!