Harvesting my Chicken Run Compost - Black Gold!

[gtaus]

A few pictures of my sifting setup...very low tech but it IS custom designed to fit my wheelbarrow.

Yep, that's what I successfully used for many years. Nothing wrong with that setup. As I stated, I'm just at an age in my life where I wanted/needed a less labor-intensive method of sifting my compost and the cement mixer compost sifter was the ticket for me. I used to spend maybe 2 hours, or more, manually sifting compost to get a wagon full of compost that I now can do in 15 minutes, with much less labor, and don't feel all beat up and tired after working so hard sifting compost.

 

[gtaus]

Post about getting some compost run inputs: https://www.helpinghensfarm.com/post/cemetery-cleanup-carbon-influx

Great story. Recommend others take a look at the short article. Love how you take all that debris and turn it into something valuable - compost in the chicken run. Of course, that's what I do at my home, but I don't have a bunch of cub scouts helping. Just me, a former cub scout myself.

 

[Red-Stars-in-RI]

Believe me @gtaus - I wish I had a setup like yours. I'm just not that mechanically inclined. If you ever go into the "cement mixer compost sifter" business, I'll be your first customer.

My employer has an in-vessel composter that they compost all our cafeteria food scraps in. They have a real deal commercial sifter. I gotta see if I can borrow that sucker.

 

[gtaus]

I love the sifter idea, and that is really beautiful looking compost.

For coarse sifting I have a panel of 1/2" welded wire on a wood frame (recycled from my old prefab's wall) and that can sit on a yard cart and sift right into that.

My fine sifter is a lot slower and more lowkey... hardware cloth folded around a 5 gal bucket.

Chunky bits get tossed back into the run or dumped in depressions in the lawn to help even the ground level out.

I like to show my cement mixer compost sifter, not because it sifts compost better, but because for the volume I use when I harvest my compost, the cement mixer compost sifter just makes everything so much easier and faster. Essentially, I have your 5 gallon bucket setup but instead use a 55 gallon barrel.

I usually throw my chunky bits back into the chicken run, but I like the idea of filling depressions in the lawn. I was just thinking this week about what to do with some depressions I have in my yard. Think I will dump some of my compost rejects in those depressions and pack it down with the weight of the riding mower wheels. Thanks for the suggestion.

 

[Red-Stars-in-RI]

I usually throw my chunky bits back into the chicken run, but I like the idea of filling depressions in the lawn. I was just thinking this week about what to do with some depressions I have in my yard. Think I will dump some of my compost rejects in those depressions and pack it down with the weight of the riding mower wheels. Thanks for the suggestion.

The less broken down bits could really be good for filling in holes or depressions in the yard. Then you can throw the finer compost on top and plant grass.

Like a hugelmound for your lawn.

 

[gtaus]

Believe me @gtaus - I wish I had a setup like yours. I'm just not that mechanically inclined. If you ever go into the "cement mixer compost sifter" business, I'll be your first customer.

I got the original idea from a YouTube video. I modified the design so that no drilling was required to attach the screening barrel. I think my setup for the cement mixer compost sifter is better for the modifications I made.

If you buy lots of compost, I think the cost of the project is worth it. I used to buy compost by the bag at the big box store. Paid about $5 per bag a few years ago. Anyway, I sifted enough compost in about 4 hours to pay for my cement mixer compost sifter. Not too many projects I get into that have such a short payback period. And, I had to buy a brand new cement mixer because I could not find a used one for sale. I'd recommend buying a used mixer at a good price to save even more money.

My employer has an in-vessel composter that they compost all our cafeteria food scraps in. They have a real deal commercial sifter. I gotta see if I can borrow that sucker.

Never seen one of those. Good to hear that commercial food scraps are being composted rather then just being sent to a landfill.

 

[gtaus]

Like a hugelmound for your lawn.

Well, my depressions are not that deep, but I do feel them when I am out on the riding mower. I have used sifted compost as a top dressing for planting grass. Works great.

 

[Red-Stars-in-RI]

Here's a picture of one...the thing is insane. It's like a compost pile, if a compost pile was a combination of a computer and a robot.

Organic material (food scraps for greens, wood chips for carbon) go in one end, and is slowly moved through by an auger.

Auger speed, moisture level, and more are controlled by a computer. Rough final compost comes out in about 30 days.

They let it sit, sift it, and then use it. They have a pipe coming out of it that goes into a pile of wood chips next to the device...a "bio filter" for odors.

I stuck a compost thermometer into it the other day while giving a tour...it was over 140 degrees before I finished by spiel about the composter.

 

[RoyalChick]

I turned my chicken run into a chicken run composting system a couple years ago. I throw all my wood chips, grass clippings, leaves, weeds, spent coop bedding, and just about anything else organic into the run and let the chickens break it down and turn it into compost.

Here is a picture of my run with a large pile of grass clippings I just mowed this afternoon. I don't know if the picture is clear enough, but maybe you can see that in that mowing of grass I pulled up a lot of dead leaves from last fall, lots of dead brown material on the ground, and probably a fair amount of loose dirt got sucked up into those loads. Point is, my grass clippings are not just grass, which is why I was able to pile it so high. If all I had in the bins was grass clippings, then I would never pile them that high because the pure grass clippings would heat up and smell really bad. With all that brown material in the mix I don't have to worry about a stinky pile of grass matting up and going anaerobic.

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Here is a picture of the chicken run compost that I was harvesting from the chicken run today. Note that all my chickens were all right there "helping" me as I was forking out the litter into my compost sifter. I hope you can see how darker the lower layers of the compost is. That's black gold in book.

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Here is a picture of my cement mixer compost sifter. Notice all the screened, finished compost falls into the wagon below the wire on the barrel, and the unfinished compost and larger pieces fall out the end (where I have the blue muck bucket).

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The section of the chicken run I was harvesting today was about 1 year old. In the past, I was getting about 50% finished compost in the first wagon and 50% unfinished compost in the reject wagon. Today, I was getting about 90% finished compost and maybe only about 10% rejects. So, my sifting job was really going fast today - even with the "help" of all my chickens in the area that I was harvesting. BTW, my cement mixer compost sifter sifts out about 6 cubic feet of compost every 15 minutes. I used to buy my compost at the big box stores for about $5,00 per 2 cubic bag. Now I make my own compost and sift it out to the tune of about $60 worth of compost every hour of run time with my compost sifter. Saves me a lot of money.

This year, I have built a few more 4X4 foot galvanized steel panel raised hügelkultur beds. I mix the chicken run compost 1:1 with good Red River topsoil I purchased from a local nursery. That 1:1 mix goes on the top 6-8 inches of my raised beds. Here is one of the raised beds I finished filling up today.

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I will be planting peppers in this raised bed this weekend. Where I live, our average last frost date is the end of May, so I'm right on time with my projects.

Love talking about my chicken run composting and gardening projects. Willing to answer any questions you may have, or look forward to comments and pictures of your setups. Thanks for any feedback.

I love your set-up. I have had trouble really composting in my chicken run because the chickens don't just stir it up they spread it around. It all rots down eventually but it isn't the concentrated, heat generating decomposition process that I would get in a 'bin'.
Do you just heap it up or do you contain it in some way in the run?

 

[Red-Stars-in-RI]

In a chicken run setup what you lose in "heat" you gain in "constant churn". If there's an area in my run I want the chickens to attack, I just throw a handful of whole corn or BOSS out there to motivate them. Anything they don't eat today may sprout and provide additional motivation/nutrition in the future.