Assistance Requested Regarding Straw

[ChickensLove]

Peanut hills are easy to clean up but I have no idea how warm they’d be.

Thank you so much! Sounds like an interesting a good idea. Wondering, do the chickens try and eat the peanut hulls and do they keep the chickens warm? I do appreciate your idea!!

 

[A_Fowl_Guy]

Thank you so much! Sounds like an interesting a good idea. Wondering, do the chickens try and eat the peanut hulls and do they keep the chickens warm? I do appreciate your idea!!

I’ll ask my neighbor, she uses that. I use straw haha.

 

[1cock2hens]

Rice hulls are used sometimes in commercial poultry raising with good results. when i was growing up we always tried to use rice hulls, less dust and better smelling then the wood chips we used previously. Now that i have my own chickens on a smaller scale i use oak leaves.

 

[CindyinSD]

I started out my chickens’ bedding with only coarse pine wood shavings, but really, it seems to me that a mix of materials is better. I’ve added the finer pine bedding, wheat straw, pine needle straw and hay the cows have trampled or that was too stale for them to want to eat. Really, any carbon material you have access to (reasonably dry) can be added. Since I’m doing “deep bedding,” I only ADD materials. I don’t take them away until it’s time to do spring cleaning. Then it will all go to the garden, or if it still needs to decompose, to a compost pile or to the poultry run.

If you have room, you’ll likely find deep bedding a great solution. You can either start with around a 12” layer of bedding, which you will turn as needed or encourage the chickens to turn. IME, you’ll need to turn it (at least the part under the roosts) every day or two. A pitchfork works best for me, but whatever you find you like using is fine. No need to spread it back out. The birds will enjoy doing that. Alternatively you can add a layer of bedding when and where you need it until the pack gets as deep as it can get in the space you have. Sometimes I add; sometimes I just turn/stir.

If it should begin to smell, add more carbon and/or turn it to get the poops covered. The carbon absorbs the ammonia and binds it so it isn’t released into the atmosphere. Ideally it will start to compost and help to keep your flock warm, but this really works best if you have a dirt floor and if you start it while the weather is warm. Even if it doesn’t compost, it will insulate the flock from the cold ground. Here’s what it looks like... this bedding is currently only around 4”-5” deep, and it’s deeper under the roosts because of course, it keeps getting added to there.