Do you Clean out poop from the run?

[aart]

I have never cleaned poop out of the run....10 years now.
But I use coarse wood chippings and have decent drainage(that I had to work at a bit),
and a place to store a huge pile.
You have to be careful with fresh 'green' wood chippings(chips from freshly cut branches with leaves), not to pile them.
But they can be fine if scraped off the outside of the pile and spread thinly(1-2") in the run.
This is enough to deter mold blooms, which can be toxic.

 

[NagemTX]

I have switched to the pine nugget / bark natural mulch. I did this because lately when we get rain it greater than inch at a time. It's more like 5 inches plus. The coops/runs get water in them and the pine nuggets are working. Will see how it is a year from now.

 

[SueT]

I think whether you clean out the run or not would depend on the amount of space per chicken. I’ve never cleaned out my runs, but I add shavings from the wood shop and firewood cutting. And the trees overhead are dropping lots of leaves in there now. You could rake up bags of leaves for the run if there are no overhead trees.
I also have a rotational run that I close off and let weeds grow in and then let the flock enjoy that for a few days at a time.

 

[SamIamNam786]

Nah, usually they scratch it around, and it gets squished in, but some of it is still there!
So I take it that hemp works well for you?

I was a skeptic, but tbh Hemp is amazing. I added DE and then the hemp, about 2-3". It's been 1.5 months and it's so clean (well there are some molted feathers scattered around in the coop), but no smell. I do use a poop board under the roost, which i clean daily or every other day. It's breaking down some now, but I'm thinking maybe I'll throw it into the run and start fresh again at the end of this month. I used literally 4 handfuls from the large bag. So i have no doubt that the bag will last me the year. I also have a bag of pine shavings, which I might add to the hemp for additional warmth only during the winter.

 

[SamIamNam786]

I think whether you clean out the run or not would depend on the amount of space per chicken. I’ve never cleaned out my runs, but I add shavings from the wood shop and firewood cutting. And the trees overhead are dropping lots of leaves in there now. You could rake up bags of leaves for the run if there are no overhead trees.
I also have a rotational run that I close off and let weeds grow in and then let the flock enjoy that for a few days at a time.

Wow I like the rotational run idea! I'm thinking once I take out the integration coop, I'll add a small garden bed with herbs and cover it with Hardware cloth, so the chickens can peck through to get the greens. Run is plenty large for 5 chickens.

 

[ChickenLoverTrin]

I was a skeptic, but tbh Hemp is amazing. I added DE and then the hemp, about 2-3". It's been 1.5 months and it's so clean (well there are some molted feathers scattered around in the coop), but no smell. I do use a poop board under the roost, which i clean daily or every other day. It's breaking down some now, but I'm thinking maybe I'll throw it into the run and start fresh again at the end of this month. I used literally 4 handfuls from the large bag. So i have no doubt that the bag will last me the year. I also have a bag of pine shavings, which I might add to the hemp for additional warmth only during the winter.

Yeah, I was considering adding it as some of my family use it with theirs. Sounds good! Thankyou!

 

[Sally PB]

When I'm walking in the run and see a new poop, I'll push some dirt/leaves/shavings over it with my shoe so if I step on it, it doesn't stick.

I add lots of leaves to the run in the fall. The chickens love it. In the spring, I dig out probably a cubic yard of the best compost for my garden. Then I clean out the coop and they spread the shavings/poop around and the cycle repeats. I might clean out the coop this fall... just because. Or I might just put a new bale of shavings in to top off what's there.

 

[SamIamNam786]

When I'm walking in the run and see a new poop, I'll push some dirt/leaves/shavings over it with my shoe so if I step on it, it doesn't stick.

I add lots of leaves to the run in the fall. The chickens love it. In the spring, I dig out probably a cubic yard of the best compost for my garden. Then I clean out the coop and they spread the shavings/poop around and the cycle repeats. I might clean out the coop this fall... just because. Or I might just put a new bale of shavings in to top off what's there.

That's usually what I do, pile on a couple of pieces of bark over it. Today I set up my coop for winter by adding 1/2 hemp and 1/2pine and DE. Let's see how many months I can go without freaking out about cleaning it, tbh when I cleaned the old hemp out today, I was like I think I'm wasting this bc it's still so clean. I dumped it on the floor to cover some mud spots. They enjoyed kicking through it. I also added in a bag of topsoil and a bag of all purpose sand in the middle of the run so they can dirt bathe in it.

 

[perkolator]

I don't really clean out the bedding from my run area either, aside from the more poopy area directly under where they sleep inside their structure. In a big space like pictured, bedding will combine with the native soil and make a nice compost/humus if the ground is allowed to get wet every now and then. Think of it as a giant compost pile that gets mixed up by the chickens while they forage through it, eventually you'll just be adding more organic material to this as you see the ratio become more fine particles than the coarse - leaves, wood chips, straw bales, grass clippings, shavings, those wood pellets - whatever you want.

If you're noticing moisture issues already, the wood chips should help considerably if you make it deep enough to get their feet above the saturation. I use wood chips even when they're fresh; when fresh chips are piled up, they'll compost and get full of fungal mycelium and will "age" - but when fresh chips are spread around by chickens it's going to dry out pretty fast and not be a problem IMO.

Those pellet bedding/firewood pellets will all just turn into sawdust once it gets wet, not the greatest choice for bedding on it's own unless you have a dry area, but integrated with other things like chunkier wood chips in an outdoor run is a good addition for more fine material if you're trying to make a nice compost for amending the garden.

That's how I treat my run - it's got several cubic yards worth of organics added on top of the native soil over the last couple years. Now that it's established, inn the fall and spring I'll go inside and rake the chunky bits over to one side, so I can harvest about a yard of the goods. It's probably fine as-is, but I've been sticking it all in a big compost pile adjacent my chicken area and get it wet to hot compost before using it to amend my property.

 

[SmiYa0126]

I clean poop in my run and the coop. I put mulch, leaves, and some pine shavings. I noticed that I didn't have to clean my whole run out as much this year. I think I only did it once, before it was once a season.