Can you review my coop maintenance?

[RaesChicks]

I’ve made some adjustments to my coop maintenance in the past two weeks hoping to ease the amount of time I spend shoveling and raking along with the amount I have been spending on bedding.

Previously I raked out my run to bare dirt and shoveled out the top layer every 3-7 days. In the coop I used a 1-2” layer of fine or flake pine bedding, removing it to the compost pile every other day and replacing it. Eventually this turned to adding more layers on top to extend it a day or two but overall the result was about 3 packs of bedding a week, or about $22.

Our coop is 8’l x 4’w x 6’h on the run side and we have 12 hens, one of which is a silkie bantam. Based on my friends’ experiences with chickens we didn’t expect for them all to make it with the amount of predators around so I realize we are a little underbuilt. We do plan to expand eventually it’s just not in the budget right now.

Anyways, I recently switched to pine pellets to see if I could stretch the coop bedding and save some money. It’s been two weeks since I shoveled it out, (raised deck flooring in the coop, no ground contact). I have added bags of bedding so we are at about 4.5 bags total on the floor for two weeks Which is about $26 in cost. I also have switched to adding layers of bedding, 7 year old wood chips from under my kids playground, hay, pine nugget mulch, and pine shavings to the floor of the run rather than shoveling it out. The smell and look in both areas is much improved, though we have seen more of the occasional poopy foot prints on the eggs lately.

My main concern is cleanliness. I’d love to do poop boards and sand but I just can’t make that happen right now. I want to keep my flock and family healthy, I have pics below for reference. I know I need more space but until then do my practices seem safe? Are there any changes to maintenance I should look at? Build recommendations are ok but please understand we have probably spent at least $700 so far I originally meant to repurpose my kids old playground cabin and parts for $150 or less build. So we will get there eventually but I can’t make any significant build changes in the near future.

I appreciate any and all feedback, but please be kind

 

[goats-n-oats]

It looks like a spacious, clean coop. Hens look happy and productive!
As far as safety, can you stretch chicken wire or hardware cloth along the floor as well, sealing it to the floor joists (?) to prevent rats or predators from digging under?
A dog would be the final touch for coop defense. It turns out one of my dogs loves to sunbathe for hours out front which keeps the minks away.
Also, it sounds like you're spending a lot on bedding. As a suggestion, I invested in a chipper-shredder with the intent to make mulch of all the tree waste on my property and use that as bedding, then recycle it as fertilized mulch for my fruit trees. The only expense there is gasoline. I'm not sure how much land you have, but possibly neighbors might be happy to let you shred a prepared pile of branches. 50lb feed bags are good for storing the chips.

 

[rosemarythyme]

How big is the run?

I think you're overdoing it on cleaning... I'd be exhausted if I cleaned that much! Chickens don't need a sterile environment.

I spot clean my coop and run daily but that means picking up obvious poops and that's all. I do a full cleanout of the coop once a year (all bedding goes into the run, new bedding goes in). The run is deep litter, so while I occasionally sift out dirt for my garden and add in materials as I needed it mostly just takes care of itself. I added extra chips last year for drainage: https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/prepping-deep-litter-for-fall.1599199/ but that's a once every 2 years sort of thing.

I also don't pay for litter as I can source most of what I need from the property (we keep the mulch from having tree service, gather and store dried leaves in fall, gather dried grass clippings and garden trimmings from spring to fall). Only cost is for a bag of hemp that lasts about 18 months to 2 years, since that makes the under roost area easier to sift clean.

 

[StinkyAcres]

I agree with the others - your coop looks good and you're probably cleaning more than necessary. Similar to @rosemarythyme , I clean out my coop about twice a year and the soiled bedding goes into the compost and garden. I have pans under the roosts to collect most of the poop and dump them when needed. As long as the bedding stays dry I don't worry about it. That said I do think you need to clean more because of the number of birds you have confined to that one area.

I would make one suggestion and that is to lower the roost or at least have some lower roosts leading up to that high one. I worry about heavier chickens hurting themselves getting down.

 

[rosemarythyme]

That said I do think you need to clean more because of the number of birds you have confined to that one area.

Good point - I had asked about the run size and then sort of forgot about that line of thought. Volume of litter vs volume of poop plays a role in determining how often you need to clean, as does climate, bedding materials, management technique, etc.

 

[RaesChicks]

Thank you for your feedback. I would read the posts about coop maintenance and see so many say they clean their coop daily. I was under the impression there should never be visible droppings in the coop. The amount of cleaning and cost was just not maintainable for me with the way I was approaching it. Seeing my measurements, do you think once a month or every other month is better? My girls do get to free range when we are home, they have just been contained more since some new neighbors joined the community and seem to have trouble keeping track of their dogs. One of ours makes a really good watch dog but he lives inside and gets quite filthy on duty.

 

[StinkyAcres]

Thank you for your feedback. I would read the posts about coop maintenance and see so many say they clean their coop daily. I was under the impression there should never be visible droppings in the coop. The amount of cleaning and cost was just not maintainable for me with the way I was approaching it. Seeing my measurements, do you think once a month or every other month is better? My girls do get to free range when we are home, they have just been contained more since some new neighbors joined the community and seem to have trouble keeping track of their dogs. One of ours makes a really good watch dog but he lives inside and gets quite filthy on duty.

You're welcome! I'd say if it's still fluffy and dry at a month you can wait longer. Doing spot cleaning, especially under the roost, and adding thin layers of bedding like you're doing will make the bedding last longer too. They are chickens - eat and poop is what they do, and they make great compost by scratching their own poop into the bedding and soil. Some people prefer to have a cleaner coop so they can spend time in the coop with the chickens, but it's not as necessary for the chickens.

 

[rosemarythyme]

I'd say if it's still fluffy and dry at a month you can wait longer. Doing spot cleaning, especially under the roost, and adding thin layers of bedding like you're doing will make the bedding last longer too.

x2. Play it by ear and adjust as needed. If you start noticing odor or moisture or the bedding is just so soiled that it's not usable any longer, then it definitely needs to be cleaned, but if you do some spot cleaning daily or every couple of days, I'm thinking you can probably stretch out your cleanout time a lot longer than you'd think. Once a month or once every two months is likely a realistic goal.

 

[RaesChicks]

Thank you, that’s what I was unsure of. I have a very full schedule and if I were home more during daylight hours I’d be out there all the time, but my routine was taking me a few hours every Sunday and it kept a lot of other things from getting done. I’ll make sure to do more scooping rather than turning the bedding over like I have been. I added some more shavings yesterday to make landing from the roost softer and I’m trying to figure out how to do lower roosts with a poop board under it, just trying to figure out if the back of the coop or closer to the door would be smartest for cleaning. If I can put that in over the next two weeks I’ll do a deep clean and start again. Thanks again!

 

[Kentucky Fan]

You definitely do not need to clean or replace bedding nearly as often as you are