Sanitizing a New Coop

[Mitchell Farm]

I am preparing to move my chicks from the house into their new coop. The coop has a wooden floor. I have yet to decide what to use to waterproof it, but was wondering if I need to completely clean the entire area with some type of disinfectant. I am relatively new to raising chickens (its been 40 years!). Any sage advice out their amongst the experts?

 

[4 the Birds]

Bleach will kill just about anything if you want to disinfect. Just dilute it with mostly water and then rinse with all water (wear gloves and have plenty of ventilation). Hopefully your coop flooring is pre-treated wood. If it is then ample pine chips on that and you are good to go. Even non treated wood that is up off the ground should be fine for inside the coop since it will be dry inside. A floor bedding is key to keep things dry and solidify any runny poo. My coop floor has wood planks below the bedding. Any water container spillage drains right down through the floor. Works perfectly! Hope this helps.

 

[Egghead_Jr]

When I first got chickens thought the floor needed to be tile or some sort of sealer to keep. Now I see I was over thinking it all. 4 The Birds is right on in saying your litter used, I use pine chips, absorbs all moisture you only need to replace it every few months or when overly dirty.

 

[Mitchell Farm]

Thanks for the reply. My flloor is not treated lumber. It is old one by 12 oak flooring. I have not treated it with anything at this point. Would sealing it with something like Thompson's Water Seal hurt chickens at all? If so, I was thinking of simply lining it with plastic and then disposing of bedding and plastic when I clean it.

 

[Mitchell Farm]

Thanks for the reply. Being relatively new to raising chickens, I just wanted to make sure that I have all ready to go in a couple weeks when the little ladies and gentemen will be moved to their new accomodations. I feel pretty confindent now that your advice is spot on. I use wood chips now in thier brooder and they work very well. I have access to a lot of straw as well. Would this work also?

 

[yyz0yyz0]

I don't have chickens yet, coop is under construction. But I have been cleaning a neighbors coop for a couple years now as I wanted the manure for my compost pile.

He used to use straw but now only uses pine chips. The two problems with the straw were finding a hen with a piece of straw stuck in her throat and he found that it got matted up more than the pine chips. the birds were less able to scratch around in the straw then they were with the pine chips. This also made cleaning harder as it all just became one moist clump of bedding vs lose chips.