Do you clean your chickens? Mine have poop everywhere!

[adshoemake]

Ok my chickens are only about 2 months old but they poop everywhere and walk in it.....no big deal. But they get it all over each other quite often. Right now they all have it on their backs and a couple have poop on their heads? They have plenty of room but they just crap all over each other. Is there an easy way to clean them or maybe something specific I should clean them with? Or should I just not worry about it? It's so gross and my 4 year old son feels the need to point it out on a daily basis that they have poop on them Thanks

 

[Kasey]

I have heard that you can give them baths with warm water. I've never tried it myself though.

 

[RRIRMom]

I have only 4 chickens, 2 that are kept in a dog carrier until they are large enough to join my two 11 week olds. In the dog carrier I have pine shavings that I clean 2xs a day. Now that they are 6 weeks old, during the day they are kept outside on the grass in a 3' x 4' covered dog pen. I hose down their dropping 2xs a day.

My two 11 week olds are kept in a covered dog kennel with commercial grade #30 sand floor. I use a screen poop scooper 2xs a day. They are the cleanest because the sand method is the best at keeping the chickens clean and living area order free.

The pine shavings is the hardest to keep clean and if they walk on their droppings, it sticks to their feet. Early on I learned to keep their feet clean as the pine shaving/pooh mix can wrap around the toe and when it dries can cut circulations. So daily, I rinsed their feet if needed and make sure their bedding is clean. I wear medical gloves--$9 for 200, and pick out the droppings. Then, once a week I discard the bedding and wash out the cage.

I keep their cages clean whether I am bed ridden, sick or not.

Disease comes from unsanitary conditions. This is not safe for the chickens, you or your son. You need to rethink your chickens bedding.

If your chickens live in clean conditions, I am sure that will eliminate them from being covered in pooh. I rinse my chickens feet outside with the garden hose and pat dry afterwards. Not sure about wetting down chickens to clean them...I will leave that to those who have more experience. But as far as keeping their area clean should eliminate future messes.

Also for space, each chicken needs amble room. In my case, I would not exceed 50 sq feet for 4-6 chickens. 4 is perfect as 6 would be cutting it close for 50 sq feet of space.

 

[kuntrygirl]

If I see pastey butts, I wash their butts.

 

[adshoemake]

They actually stay pretty clean in the coop itself. We have pine shavings in there. We also have a huge 8ft run that we built onto the coop so they sat outside most of the time. We hose the ground out there too and keep the poop washed away. And they do walk in it sometimes which is inevitable with chickens but most of what they have on them is from standing and laying close together and one not getting out of the way. They all stay very close together no matter how much room they have so it's not a sanitary issue on my part. They just like to crap on each other! Their feet stay pretty clean but I thought I would just ask to make sure there wasn't some magical way of keeping them clean beside the obvious!

 

[shmccarthy]

My chickens had the the same problem, I bathed them and put down fresh bedding. They're okay to bathe as long as they're completely feathered and you blowdry them completely after. Mine love the blowdryer! and make sure they go to a warm place after if it isn't too warm outside. I just put mine under a heat lamp and they all warmed right up. I used dawn dish soap on the feathers, not too much though because too much can dry out the skin, and it got the feathers really clean.
They will really appreciate it if you clean it off them!

 

[BantamFan4Life]

It isn't necessary to clean your chickens if you don't want to. You can give it a bath but people usually only do that before a show. Try cleaning your pen or coop more frequently and use shavings instead of straw (if you don't already). If it bothers you that much just give your little chickens a nice bath.