Results from First Year with Deep Litter Method

[duckinnut]

There is a little thing to help with the smell that I stumbled upon completely by accident. I had a brush pile in my yard for a while and finally got around to burning it. Anyhow after it burned down and put the rest out with water, I left the ash and leftover black bits for the girls to dust bath in. Well they decided to eat the charcoal bits,there was a black poop epidemic. Concerned it would hurt them, I did some research. It seems that charcoal was regularly fed years ago to aid digestion and filter toxins from them. As far as I read it was a general barnyard practice for all livestock. But the added result was a poop with no ammonia smell as the charcoal neutralized the smell. The chemical reaction turns the ammonia to ammonium which is less harmful as less aromatic. The past couple of weeks I had noticed that the coop was devoid of that coop scent never realizing the cause until I stumbled upon the black poop and charcoal research.

 

[Beekissed]

Charcoal was also fed as a natural dewormer and I do the same with my sheep, as well as my chickens. They regular feed from and dust bathe in our outdoor firepit for just this purpose. Even the wild birds,especially the barn swallows, love the charcoal bits and will eat them like feed at certain times.

My granny used to throw a charred log in with the pigs for this reason as well.

You can use wood ash as a great neutralizer in your bedding and it will help keep any parasitic bugs away as well. I've even placed wood ashes in the nest boxes along with the regular bedding there.

 

[Daisy8s]

Quote:

There is a little thing to help with the smell that I stumbled upon completely by accident. I had a brush pile in my yard for a while and finally got around to burning it. Anyhow after it burned down and put the rest out with water, I left the ash and leftover black bits for the girls to dust bath in. Well they decided to eat the charcoal bits,there was a black poop epidemic. Concerned it would hurt them, I did some research. It seems that charcoal was regularly fed years ago to aid digestion and filter toxins from them. As far as I read it was a general barnyard practice for all livestock. But the added result was a poop with no ammonia smell as the charcoal neutralized the smell. The chemical reaction turns the ammonia to ammonium which is less harmful as less aromatic. The past couple of weeks I had noticed that the coop was devoid of that coop scent never realizing the cause until I stumbled upon the black poop and charcoal research.

Huh, that's interesting. Awhile ago someone mentioned that they regularly add ash from their wood stove to the floor of their coop. I assumed it was to help absorb moisture but according to what you learned it would also absorbed odors.

As far as absorbing toxins...don't they give charcoal to people who have overdosed? I guess I'll be adding our fire pit ashes to the coop now, too! Thanks for the tip!

 

[joan1708]

Very interesting information. Thank you.

 

[leilani10]

Great advice. I shoveled a buckey of top soil from the pile in the far corner of our property. I dumped it in the corner of their run. WELL they loved it. Thanks for all the advice, Leilani

 

[leilani10]

Great to get so much help at the tips of my fingers. You people are all great. Thanks for all the answers to my newbie ? s' Leilani10

 

[Baymule]

I toss all kinds of stuff in the coop. Right now the girls are "processing" sweet potato vines. They ate all the leaves and are pooping on the vines. They get corn cobs after we eat supper, they get corn shucks, pea hulls, all kinds of garden plants, grass clippings, leaves and sawdust. They also get kitchen scraps, including meat scraps. Today they got shrimp heads and shells. When I clean out the coop, I get lots of crumbly, dark rich compost.

After cleaning the coop, it is smelly and attracts gnats because it is damp. I lime the floor, not with hydrated, and rake it in. I let the floor (dirt) dry a few days before putting more litter in. For the gnats that appear, whether from the coop or just generally wet conditions sometimes, I spray the girls with vanilla.

I was heading to the coop with a sausage that stayed too long in the refrigerator and my DH protested on behalf of the dogs. I told him, "Give a chicken a sausage, you get an egg. Give a dog a sausage, you get a turd."

 

[Barrdwing]

This spring marked one year since I started using the deep litter method and I thought I'd share my results.

THE COOP
Last spring I built my coop with a dirt floor on top of an old gravel pile. It's a high, dry spot with excellent drainage. The coop is approx 6x8, with an interior feed room so the chicken area is actually 6 x 5 1/2.

THE BEGINNING
To begin the bedding I placed 3-4 inches of wood chips atop the dirt/gravel floor. Next, I added 2-3 inches of 2 yr old composted dirt from my old compost pile to "seed" the floor with healthy bacteria. Then, I put in about 4 inches of fresh grass clippings. After a few weeks I felt the manure smell was too strong so I repeated the 2-3 inches of composted dirt plus more grass clippings. That did the job and so long as I maintained the coop (see below) I never had a smell again.

This spring I cleaned out the coop for the first time. The bedding had built up between 18 and 24 inches at that point! I filled my first wheelbarrow load and was delighted when I lifted it to realize how light it was. This clearly was not sodden, slimy stuff. Except for a small 1x1 ft patch under the favorite section of the perch, it was not wet or heavy. In fact, I even found earthworms living in the bedding that must have come in with the composted dirt at the beginning!

FINAL ADVICE
This works best with plenty of sq ft per bird. 5-6 sq ft per bird is ideal, 4 was manageable but required more bedding than I'd anticipated.

Daisy8s, I read your account of the deep litter method with considerable interest. I'm particularly intrigued by the fact that your coop has a dirt floor and was built on an old gravel pile, because I am trying to figure out what to do with my own dirt-floor coop. I want to try the deep litter method, but our "coop" is actually a shed barn (14' X 36') with several inches of pea gravel on the dirt (clay) floor. I'm concerned that if I try to do deep litter on top of that gravel, I'll end up with gravel all through the litter and that would be a real nuisance. But it sounds like you managed quite well. What kind of gravel was in the pile that your coop was built on? Maybe my problem is that pea gravel is so darned light and easy to stir up. I am thinking that I may have to just remove it and replace it with sand.

Second question: We have a much higher square footage per bird in the barn; it varies from 9 to 13 square feet per bird. I don't know if our chickens will turn over the litter enough for it to fluff up and compost nicely. What do you think, based on your experiences?

Third question: We do get some water in the coop from the surrounding slope. I'm going to work on improving our drainage and runoff diversion, but it may still get damp around the edges of the walls. How well does the deep litter method work when there's dampness to contend with? In the past when we tried a version of deep litter, we used straw, which got matted and very smelly when wet. The wet areas never did compost well, but areas that were only damp actually composted beautifully. I'm trying to figure out where the balance lies in terms of how much damp is workable and how much is too much. I also wonder whether I should just ixnay the straw and go to wood shavings or chips, or maybe a mix of some straw and a lot of shavings/chips.

Thank you, and I'd appreciate any opinions or suggestions!

 

[Brucepierce]

Here's a question for you folks who are using the deep litter method, I have a coop with a plywood floor that I have primed and painted and also used a roofing sealer ( as suggested by jackE) would you folks still put soil down on top of your first layer of pine shavings? Do we think it would affected the sealed plywood? I have access to loads of wood stove ash also,would I use that as a layer a few inches deep or just sprinkle on top? Thanks for your comments.

 

[Beekissed]

I think it would be just fine~I did deep litter on an unsealed but very cured out oak floor for quite a few years~ and I'd forego the wood ashes unless you have some kind of infestation...which should be prevented by the use of a balanced deep litter system.