I live in Louisiana. The cold I am not worried about. It's December 5th and we are still having 80 degree weather. YUCK!!
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I just came in from collecting eggs. It's 29° here with a wind chill of only 22°. Must remember to wear my gloves next time!I live in Louisiana. The cold I am not worried about. It's December 5th and we are still having 80 degree weather. YUCK!!
I have a concrete floor also. Great for foiling digging pests! I use 5 inches of flake pine shavings. I don't remove any this time of year as we are doing the deep litter method. I toss in a handfull of black oil sunflower seeds (boss) or scratch before entering the coop, pick up their water and by the time I empty and rinse and refill the girls have turned the litter over for me. I use a stiff tine rake every few days to a week to give a deep stir and move it around good-this keeps a "cap" from forming to the litter stays to were it will continue to absorb, watch for wet spots and remove them-spilled water under a fount. Yes-- it can get dusty but not as bad as sand. In the summer I remove the entire foor litter and restart after a through coop cleaning/and dry. The major part of the poo is under my deep poop box--that gets scooped daily--so much less smelly with the PDZ. the choices of sand--too dusty, and straw-too many place for lice and mites to hide in, the only other one I might try is the- newer pelleted pine bedding.Hello everyone, I came to the conclusion in September that I wanted chickens. I have a beautiful gazebo in my backyard that just sits there. I go in it once a year and get all the spider webs down and hose all the pollen out of it. My sister and her husband are going to help me convert it to a chicken house. At first my husband thought I was losing my mind..."Your getting what?"....but now he is excited about it also. I am waiting until March to get our new babies. I have been reading books and pouring over this wonderful website. I have to say, I had already designed my house but now I am redesigning and putting in the poop boards and using the Sweet PDZ. This is the most wonderful idea I have seen. Thanks Trish for such a great plan. I only have one problem, I can't decide what to use on the floor. It is a washed concrete floor and I want to use something over it. I have researched and decided to use river sand but after reading so many posts and what you said about the smell of sand after a while, I am thinking pine shavings. But then everybody complains about how much work pine shavings are. I am sooo confused! Please help. I really want to use the sand. What about using sand and putting in the PDZ? After I started reading this thread I thought I would just use PDZ on the whole floor of the coop but then I read about how one person said it was not a good idea. HELP! Like I said, I'm not fixing it until March so I still have time to change things.
What is sweet pdz is that diatomaceous earth