Possible idea to manage coop waste/cleaning

[Campesina]

I love this!! I have sand in my run and I really need one of those long handled cat box scoopers. I tried making one but I need to try harder or go look for what you have.
Than you !!

 

[ladybrasa]

Problem solved and it looks great. Your chickens have adequate floor space in the coop? For 36 birds that would be minimum of 144sq ft in coop and 360sq ft in run.

Hi, sorry for the delay in response! I haven’t popped on in a bit. I never remember the exact dimensions, but the run is huge and exceeds the 360 square feet. I think it’s at least 700?? And we are going to add a daytime un covered pen off the run as well. The coop I think is probably around the 144 square feet, so adequate for sleeping/roosting and daily busy hens. However, the 36 adults are currently restricted to one side of the coop (there’s 2sections) for summer and into fall, because I’m growing out (right word?) a zillion chicks in the other section. So currently, yes, the coop sections are cramped, but they get along well enough to handle it, until I get the juveniles sorted out in the fall.

 

[Omletta]

So I have a large walk in coop, like big enough to be a tiny home. Cleaning out the pine shavings is a huge undertaking, and potentially a dangerous one, since I still breathe in dust despite wearing double masks. And I don’t get to do it very often. I’ve got plywood floors. And at the moment, 36 chickens. So much poop! Anyway, I like the idea of poop boards that all you need is to scoop the poop and rarely have to clean the rest of the coop, since a majority of the poop happens under the roost or outside in the run. However, a poop board is totally not possible with my coop. So I think I came up with something that works for me, kind of like a poop board but not … basically a big litter box. So far it seems to be working! I wanted to pass this along in case anyone else might get some ideas from it for their situation/set up.

So my roost area (one of them) is roughly 6’ by 6’. It is a bit lower than I like, but there are hinges so I can lift it up to get under it. I cleaned out the coop (at least that side of it). Laid down a sturdy tarp (8x6 or 8x8 or thereabouts). Then I got a bunch of half size cinder blocks, the ones with the openings (so they’d be a little lighter to handle!). I basically laid out a border on the tarp around the roost. This way it’s not permanent, I didn’t have to figure out how to build a border, and they are heavy enough the chickens shouldn’t be able to topple them. Then I poured out horse PDZ in it, and put pine flakes on the outside. Sweet PDZ is not as expensive as I was thinking! Anyway, appearantly there exists cat litter scoops with long handles so I got one. I have not seen or been able to create a sifter of larger dimensions, at least one with a good price point. Anyway, so far, I can scoop the roost poop into a bucket, and if I can do so at least once a week, I feel that this is far preferable to the huge undertaking of cleaning out pine shavings. In theory, I shouldn’t have to worry about the pine shavings in the rest of the coop for a long time. It’s not perfect, but it’s a chicken coop so …

Here are a few pics:
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Hopefully they won't use it for dust baths. Seems like a good idea for a larger coop, though.