I'm such an idiot. I thought I was taking such good care of my little flock. Last night when I was buying new sand for the run I noticed a bag of Diatomaceous Earth for swimming pool filters & thought oh yes, I've heard about that stuff, it will help keep the run fresh & clear of pests. So this morning I mixed it in with the new sand ~10 lbs per 200 lbs of sand. Then I read that it's not the right stuff at all! So I'm in a bit of a panic, what have I done?! It's silicon. What will this do to my chickens?
Yeah, I would get a dust mask on and shovel it out of there. Make sure the chickens are not exposed to the dust while you are doing it. Better to just get rid of it than to be anxious forever!
Okay, I scraped out as much of the sand as I could. Hosed everything down. Then hauled in 400 lb of clean sand. I am so beat! Still stressed about what I've exposed myself & my chickens to, but I bet I have the cleanest coop in the county. Let this be a lesson to me, next time do your rescearch BEFORE trying something new. Where can you get the proper kind of DE?
Quote:I buy mine at the feed store and it says food grade on the bag- that it is used to add to feed for animals.
I got my last batch from: http://www.earthworkshealth.com/ It is also available from Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/Diatomaceous-Earth-Food-Grade-10/dp/B00025H2PY You could call the company that makes it to find out if you can buy it locally to save on shipping.