coop is a fly infested mess.

[Vicki53813]

I am very grossed out and discouraged. My ducks are only about 2 months old and only been in their coop that my husband made for about a month. I will post a picture so you know what the coop looks like. Any hel would be greatly appreciated.

One problem I have noticed is the ground in the coop stays damp. It is sitting on grass with wire across the bottom to keep out predators. For the first week or so I would spray off the wire and the grass every day to eliminate the poop. I also had a kiddie pool in the coop ( which is now outside the coop and I only let the duck swim outside the coop when they roam).

about the beginning of the second week the flies was/are CRAZY... 1000s of them.. I took a step back and tried to think about what was going on. I spray it out and keep it as clean as I can. eliminate extra food and poop as much as I can.

I than thought, ok must need more air movement to dry it out , SO I bought a big fan, ran an extension cord from the house and put it inside the coop. I also bought a bunch of DE powder/ food grade and put it all over inside the sleep area of the coop on the ground a little in the food.. and I wait. Flies are still there.. No ill effect on those **** things..

The air movement helped and the DE did absolutely nothing,.

Couple days later, I stood and looked at the mess of a coop. Thought to myself ok... Gotta be something else I can do. So I went and bought the really thin shaved cedar or wood shaving. what ever it is. Put a 2-3 inch layer down.

This helped A LITTLE but the bottom layer of the shavings were wet. When I walked on it to scoop out the poop or fill the water pan or feed I could see my shoe imprints on the ground.So every so often I would go out and move the shavings around with a shovel to dry out the underneath layer.

I also rigged up the water container to catch the water that the ducks made a mess when drinking. I would catch it in lower pan and dump it out side the coop.

I would clean the top layer by taking a shovel and throwing it away. Each time i did this of course I took some of the wood shaving out and it was to a point I needed to either clean all the old out and add all new.

After work tonight i again stood and look at the mess. It had rained yesterday and this morning so I needed to get all the wet out, which was most of what was left in there. I thought no big deal scoop it out and add new shaving.

Well this is where the Gross **** happens. As Im scooping the shaving out I look and 1000000 of maggots are on my shovel.

Ok to make a long story shorter, lol I quickly got my ducks out of the coop. I removed most of the bedding thinking WTH am i gonna do with this bedding. I have no where to burn it I thought BLeach kills everything. in huge buckets and wheel barrels I put the shaving and bleach and filled it with water. I dumped bleach all over the ground in the coop. on the wire floor on the mud/grass and slowly added water so it would cover the floor area of the coop... and at this time I literally got sick.I took my ducks to the other side of the yard to eat and forage for food etc. later I checked and could not see any life of bugs in the coop. except for a few fly that are breeding on the outside of the coop. i waited for the water to soak into the ground and put more fan to move the bleach smell After about 2 hours I put the ducks in the upper part ( not the bleached area) and locked them in.

I honestly dont know what im gonna do if this is gonna happen every 2 weeks or so... Very dscouraged.

 

[Vicki53813]

Here is my post with pictures of the coop

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/994863/hello-new-to-byc-and-keeping-ducks#post_15471099

 

[Amiga]

It is wise to temporarily move the ducks out of that area, to another safe place, till you get the maggot situation under control.

Flies breed in wet manure, so the hosing may be doing as much harm as good. It's a steep learning curve, and each of us has a different setup, making it tricky sometimes.

Is the bottom of the coop - I mean the little shelter, not the whole pen - wire? And you also have wire across the bottom of the pen? Just trying to picture it.

I know some folks use the heavy stall mats as a base that they can hose off - and I have not read that they have maggots on the mats.

I use fly predators - get a little packet once a month during fly season, and set it out under an eave near the pen. I also use fly traps (the ones that have a flexible bag with bait to which you add warm water seem to work the best for us. I have read that the Little Tree Vanilaroma car deodorants deter flies, and I hang one near the door of the night shelter.

If the bottom of the coop (the little house with the ramp going up to it) is wire, there's not much to do there - except on a different note, I would cover it with something like an old towel and then daily take the towel out and shake it over the bushes and hang it out. After a few days you can make a wash load of the old towels. Or you can rinse them outside with a hose.

If you want to use shavings, I have read cedar shavings are toxic to ducks, so avoid those. If manure is stirred into a high-carbon material like chopped straw or sawdust, that can discourage flies, based on my experience.

Those are my ideas - hang in there, thousands of people are keeping their ducks without big fly problems - you just need to step back and see what you can adjust.

How often did you say you hose out the pen? Daily?

Is the pen moveable at all?

 

[Vicki53813]

Hi Thank you for your reply.. At the beginning or about a month ago I would hose it out everyday thinking this would wash the manure away and keep it cleaner. After I would spray it out it would dry our or I thought it would, it looked dry anyway. at that time it was just grass and it would have pretty good air flow, part sun and part shade of course.

Than once the flies got worse or about 2 weeks ago I decided something was wrong and cleaned it really good (scooped out the poop not sprayed it) and made sure it was as dry as it could be, I than removed the pool from inside. added the DE and the bedding all over the bottom. But I noticed in the a.m with the dew and wetness the bedding was getting wet. so I would move it around added the fan and kept it as dry as I could with water control and air movement.

No idea what else I can do. I will try your suggestions. Thank. you

 

[Vicki53813]

forgot to say the coop is not easy to move, it could be done with a lot of men and muscles but man my husband would not be happy.. He is fighting a back injury so I would hate to ask..

And the whole floor or bottom layer is all covered in wire, not the upper part of the coop or enclosed area. that is all wood,, the ramp is all wood with traction strips or rough tape on it.

 

[Amiga]

As I wrote, we all have different yards, different climates. I built our pen on a 2% slope, and have a shallow channel that carries away water from the splashing in the swim pans, and rainwater. That helps quite a bit. I spread chopped straw over the base of the pen regularly, and I pull out the composted pen bedding from time to time, maybe 3 times a year - it is fabulous compost booster!

Water pushes air out of bedding and manure, and flies love that. So, think fluffy! If I come up with a brilliant idea, I will share it. I just wonder if you need to check the slope where you are - if you are in a low spot, see if you can find a safe spot on a slight slope. 2% is just 1 inch of fall per 50 feet distance. It's not much, but it will keep the pen from being in standing water - which is also a breeding ground for botulism, and you do not want the ducklings getting that - it's fatal.

 

[Amiga]

Okay, just read your recent post.

Could you (or someone who owes you a favor, not your husband with his injury) dig a 4 inch deep, 6 inch wide channel leading away from the pen? It would need to get progressively deeper - not by much - and you could plant a shrub at the end of it - a blueberry bush would love a daily dose of duck water!

Let's see if I can sketch it


----------
[ Duck ]
[ Pen ]
---------- ccccccc
cccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccc
cccccccc


c's are the channel and shallow depression. The shallow depression is filled with mulch and has something water-loving planted in it.

And really, look into fly predators.

 

[Vicki53813]

Thank you so much.. I will try anything..

 

[Amiga]

 

[Vicki53813]

I could do that. I will give it a try. I have landscaping and bushes not to far from the coop. .