Is hay okay to use on the floor of your chicken house in the winter?

[wvchickenhouse]

I think I meant to say "straw"....thanks for all the info though. I'm going to try the deep liter method. I've got happy "girls" and my Rooster, "Wyatt Earp" who seem to like their home pretty good

 

[SteveBaz]

Quote:

The BYC

Sure it is but as mentioned above the hay will get wet and smelly and slick. Is it out of the wet? You said the floor of the chicken house so that means inside. I use shavings bc its easier to manage.

Summer

Winter time.

 

[ScottyHOMEy]

Glad to see your followup about meaning straw instead of hay.

There are all sorts of options, more than have been voiced in just this thread.

Straw is basically the stalks of small grains (wheat, oats, barley . . .) Those crops reach maturity and are best harvested at their lowest possible moisture content. Before the combine comes along, stalks and grain heads will be as dry as practicable. That leaves it as a dry and somewhat absorbent bedding. Straw is the last remnant left above ground of a petered-out plant.

Compared to straw, as a bedding material, hay has two drawbacks. It is still grren and growing (read "full of moisture") when it is first cut. The harvesting process is more complex than that of straw. (One doesn't actually harvest straw -- it's what's left over after the grain is harvested.) Once mowed, the hay is left to dry. In the case of legume hay (alfalfa, grass hay with a high clover content), it is often crimped to aid in the drying. It may be tedded (fluffed) as it dries in the warm sun before being raked up for baling. All of which serves to get it down to an optimum moisture level for storage without sacrificing too much in the way of nutrients as the cut hay begins to decay.

Those nutrients are the second factor. Straw comes from a dead plant. Hay is harvested when growing at its prime. That's why folks feed hay instead of straw. The sugars and other nutrients in hay, among the things that make it a valuable feed, are the very things that, when broken out of the bale and reintroduced to the air, will feed and promote the growth of molds and other stuff. It's that factor that makes it a poor choice for bedding.

There are choices to be made. The deep litter method relies on the birds to peck at and stir the bedding, but also on its packing down under the chickens treading over it as well as its own weight. Under the weight of the birds, the coarser grain of the straw will pack down in a short time compared to pine shavings. If you have the time to tend it, tossing (tedding) it every few days, it can make for a nice, fluffy and warmer bedding fro your birds to get down into on a cold day. If you allow it to mat, though, it can reach a tipping point at which it becomes a sodden mess.

I use shavings on the floor of the coop and straw in the nest boxes.

 

[Bear Foot Farm]

Why do you think that hay gets soggy, moldy and gross

Because that is what happens if it gets wet at all.​

 

[chuckeychickens]

Another vote for pine shavings. My chicken guru tells me that the mold in hay is bad for the chickens.

Does anyone know of a good kind of wood chipper that would make shavings? I'm tired of paying $5 a bale
at the Tractor Supply.

 

[Stephanie739]

Very informative posts! I am going to use pine shavings instead of hay! My neighbor sells hay and each winter gives me blocks for my doghouses, so I just used it for the run too. I am guessing pine will dry better in the run, right? I threw a lot of dry leaves in the other day. I like how those are handling the rain.

 

[1muttsfan]

Great post scotty, many people do not understand the difference between hay and straw. Only straw is used as bedding for large animals like horses, because it is more absorbent, softer, and less dusty.

I also use wood shavings and the deep bed method, works great.

 

[Foster Reds]

Good Morning, can someone explain deep litter method please...

 

[Fred's Hens]

Clean, beautiful yellow straw is wonderful. Nasty stuff baled up and called straw is not so great.
I love yellow straw and wood shavings. I even like them mixed. To me they are just about equal in utility. I so agree that when most folks say they don't like straw it makes me think that they've likely never had good quality straw. Once you try the real deal, you're very impressed.

Deep Litter. Type that in the specialized google search space you see right above this box, on the right hand side. You'll find hundreds of pages of quality reading.

 

[ScottyHOMEy]

Quote:
You're headed the right direction for litter/bedding in the coop, but if you're in a place that you have rain or a heavy dew on a regular basis, pine shavings are not something you want to add to your run. It's absorbent but doesn't break down easily. I'm no guru on composting, but, in the composting parlance, pine is a "brown." It needs "greens" (like lots of cut grass or manure) to heat it up to where it breaks down.

If you tend your run and coop well, there may be a balance to be found to help with breaking down the shavings in the compost pile. And maybe the moisture in a packed-down mess raked up and added to the pile will help with that, but it's gonna take some attention, tending and watching, adjusting the pile to where it cooks itself into a good compost.

so . . if it's at all wet where you are and you're up to it, you can try it, but, where I am, pine shavings in the run are a not-good thing to do.