Hi All, My name is Andrew. I am a student at Upper Canada College in Toronto and I am working on legalizing hens in the city of Toronto, with the group name, "Toronto Chickens". I currently have 4 chickens, and have a couple questions about them (I have had them for about 3 months). In the hen house (totally secured part of the coop, where they sleep and lay), do I need to put down horse bedding, or any bedding? Right now, I am putting down bedding and when they poo in the bedding, I clean everything up. This takes a long time, and it a hastle. So I was wondering, if it was even necessary to have bedding. If I do not use the bedding, then the chickens would be walking/sleeping/laying on plywood. Or should I only put bedding in their nesting boxes... What would you do? What do you recommend? Also I have a run attached to my coop. In the run, the bottom is just dirt (because they ate all the grass)! Currently I do not put bedding in the run. Should I? When I go to clean out the run, it is hard to tell what is poo and what is dirt. So I end up taking a lot out. Could I put a piece of plywood down on top of the dirt, so when they poo, it is easy to just pick it up. Or should I use gravel/sand or something to put ontop. Please help me! It is hard to clean so much every week. What do you do in your chicken run, to keep it clean? I do not know how many people respond on these things (first time using one), but I appreciate all help. In addition, here is my email address if you would like to contact me personally: [email protected] Thanks, Andrew
Hello and Good luck with your campaign! Now with the bedding... it's good if you have some inside the coop (after all, it's much easier to clean up poop with the bedding than scraping it off the plywood!), but out in the run it wouldn't be necessary. There is no grass in our chook yard, and they love it fine, the poop doesn't cause much trouble in the outdoors. Good luck! Cleaning so often does sound like a pain, how about you reduce the frequency with which you do a complete clean-out?
I always use bedding in the coop. It's some of those consequences of raising chickens; cleaning out the coop. You can stir up the shavings (I use pine shavings in my coop) to last them for a little longer. You don't really need to keep any bedding outside. The dirt has rocks chickens can use to help digest their food. Fierlin already the answer it seems! Welcome to BYC!
Wow, Thanks for responding so fast. I will try it out. I will also see what happens if I do not clean so frequently. Andrew
It should be okay, I know that some people put in a lot of bedding, then take the top layer off once in a while, that way there's no need to put new bedding in after cleaning out.
