I'll be honest im not spending as much time out there as in the summer and fall. But I did find a new use for the snow shovel by the coop. The poop boards are slanted and the poop freezes on, just run the shovel up the board and keep going across. The shovel is big enough to hold all the poop and means only one trip to the compost bin. I will use this year round.
Quote:Most definetly but for us it's rain!! It seems like just when everything starts to dry up a bit here we go again!! One big sloppy stinky mess!!
same here. We had 2 snow blizzard in 2 weeks and I don't spend much time out there with them at all. I feed and water them, collect eggs, look around for a minute or too then back inside to our house. I do watch them from our formal living room's window. It's too cold and icy. Can't wait for the weather to get warmer so my son and I can sit and watch them and provide them a cleaner coop.
yes!! I found myself singing a song today while shoveling out the wet mucky poop from our 8 coops (1.5 inches of rain today). I scrape the floors out daily to save the cost of shavings, so this is just the poop from ONE day! There are around 25 birds per coop (just for sleeping - they're free range in the day). Here's the song - though hard to say what tune it's to.... we-et poop we-et poop it's really, really, reaaaa-lly gross we-et poop we-et poop a stinky, dirty, yuuuuu-cky mess and variations thereof - singing it for the full 20 min or so of shoveling. I took comfort imagining millions of other chicken-lovers around the world doing this clean-up for their chickens too. Kind of makes me feel part of the world - separate from others yet doing the same thing - so really together in a way. Also joins us to humans throughout history - imagining the Romans and ancient Chinese caring for their chickens also. The test of time shows it's really worth it to take care of chickens, and receive the gift of watching their beauty and life activities in return (and eggs of course!)
The winter weather has not been a real problem, although we don't spend as much time with the chicks as we do when it is warmer. Maintenance in the winter is a push. The chicks spend more time in the coop and therefore there is much more poop, but the cold makes the poop clean up much easier and less smelly.
I'm not out there as much either. Just enough to keep it clean, change out the water, fill the feed and throw some fresh straw in the run every few days. Too much snow on the ground for them to want to venture out, so they have been entertaining each other.
I will admit to spending less time as well... My situation is exacerbated by only having a person sized door and no pop door. That means that during the day rain blows in there if there is wind and the chickens track mud in super easy Can't wait to move to the new house and build the new coops so I can fix some of the issues I'm having with my current one!!!
If I have to do my coop again, the coop floor will be ground and 4" higher then surrounding area so less mess to clean up.
Like everyone else here I am not spending as much time with the girls as I would like. We only have 7 hens so the chores are managable. I clean the poop board 2 or 3 times each week and try to keep the coop/run tidy. Our girls do come out and wander about the paths we shovel for them but when the wind picks up they head back for cover. Like me, they are probably wishing for spring...