Is a dust bath necessary??

[speckledhen]

M.sue :

Quote:
What is DE?

Food grade (and ONLY food grade, not pool filter grade) diatomaceous earth. http://wolfcreekranch1.tripod.com/defaq.html​

 

[chicklover16]

DE is Diatomaceous Earth.

 

[harveyhorses]

I have started calling mine the little archeoligists, they found some of the plastic farm animals I used to play with, 40 years ago!!
When you say equal parts, by volume or weight? A five gallon bucket of each, or 5lbs of each?
Mine have made several, all in really shady spots, under cedar trees so I am just going to add the other stuff to the dirt.
The downside for me is my cats love to hang out with 'the girls'.

 

[BoltonChicken]

What is DE?

Lots of post on this forum about using DE.

For the coop I put a 2 ft square x 6 inch deep box filled with sand, dirt and wood ash. They play in it daily. Dirt baths
are needed to help supply relief from excessive heat. DE put in with the dirt can help with parasites. I prefer Sevrin Dust
in light amounts.​

 

[ChicksterJo]

You don't need anything special to let your chickens have a dust bath. Our soil here is very compacted and full of clay, so the chickens can barely scratch it up themselves. So what I did was dig up a hole, big enough to fit two chickens comfortably, and then wet the soil a little. The chickens will scratch the soil up themselves to loosen it and that's it.

 

[7L Farm]

Here's one that just stopped & decided OK its bath time!!!

 

[Roo on Harley]

LOL see you're on the country...
Yeee Hawww!!!

 

[3chimama]

We have a spot in our pasture by a tree where my husband dumps the wood ashes from our stove and the girls love to "bathe" in it!

 

[M.sue]

lol...that is exactly what I remember my grandpa's chickens doing. Although I also remember him having a shallow tub filled the powdery, sandy colored like substance. Ahh haa....the dust bath!!
Quote:

 

[stilldeb]

They will create their own dust bath wherever the urge overtakes them and make some pretty good sized holes doing it. Well, my bantams make "divots" - ha. I have made some very nice dust baths before with sand and DE - and they have totally ignored them and dug their own holes in the grass and made their own. I mix a little DE in the pine shavings in the coop/ nesting boxes, too. Helps keep it dry in there, and parasites away.

First time I saw a chicken dustbathing, I thought it was having a seizure.

Oh and I just put my 3 week old Sultans outside to play for the first time yesterday and there they were, dustbathing in a bare spot in the grass.


deb g