cleaning the run

[vintagegem]

Hi everyone, just wanted to ask for advice on the best way to clean my hens outdoor run. They have a lot of free range time but when I'm not there to supervise them they have a fenced in run area attached to their coop, this area is grassed and they haven't actually destroyed it at all even though I've had them for around 7 weeks, in fact I still need to mow it each week! the only problem is its getting pretty messy with poop. I've tried raking it and was hoping that the recent heavy rain would wash most of it away but its still pretty icky

. Any ideas on how to keep it clean?

 

[vintagegem]

Oh, no replies yet

 

[JRL1438]

I spray out with a water hose like a pressure washer when the poop piles up. I also sometimes put in some pine straw or sand which the poop mostly sticks to and after it gets yuck I rake or shovel it out. The grass and weeds still grow in there. We have had lots of rain in the last few days too here in SC and i found that after rain it's always kind of messy until it dries out. I always rake it out when it is dry even if I don't use the straw or sand. I try to keep up with the weather so I can have it raked out before we have heavy rain. Hope this helps.

 

[vintagegem]

I spray out with a water hose like a pressure washer when the poop piles up. I also sometimes put in some pine straw or sand which the poop mostly sticks to and after it gets yuck I rake or shovel it out. The grass and weeds still grow in there. We have had lots of rain in the last few days too here in SC and i found that after rain it's always kind of messy until it dries out. I always rake it out when it is dry even if I don't use the straw or sand. I try to keep up with the weather so I can have it raked out before we have heavy rain. Hope this helps.

Thanks for the advice

I raked it as best as I could and then sprayed down with hose and its made a lot of difference, I think the hot dry weather has helped lately, it tends to smell a bit when the weather is humid but is noticeably fresher in the dry weather. I let them free range as much as possible and I think that helps with the poop accumulating, plus they are keeping the weeds down in my yard

 

[JRL1438]

Your welcome, glad it helped.
My chickens love the weeds, they eat them first when they are running the yard.