Sand or stone?

[Chikndinner]

If you have a pick up or know someone who does construction fill sand is only about six dollars and change per ton!! I just got a load from the local sand pit for our run. Cost me 9.69 for about 3000 pounds.

 

[jeb251]

split the difference and go for stone sand or manufactured sand, sometimes called stone sand the bits are small so no worries about choking, but the are big enough to allow excellent drainage, and it looks great, on my page there are new coops being built and the stone sand is in the runs, you can get it cheap at a quarry

 

[mamichi]

Quote:
This happened to me too! I had researched on here and read about the combo of the pea gravel and sand, but that was a horrible mistake. All the rocks came to the top and now it is impossible to clean. So frustrating. If we were to do it again, we would just use plain old sand.

 

[kichohana]

sand sand sand sand sand! skip the gravel! the chickens will just scratch it up and blend it in with the sand like the other members mentioned. i have about 5-6" sand in my run and my girls scratch all the way down to the dirt in the corners sometimes! the poo dries nicely on the sand and is easily scooped up. what i miss with the scooper dries up and gets scratched into the sand and "magically disappears"! poop-be-gone. love it. i also add a little DE to the sand to speed up the drying process, which in turn helps keep the smell down.

 

[NCchicken]

I am so glad I found this thread! I have pea gravel right now and it's awful! Just like another PP said, you can't scoop it out with the pooper scooper. So I have to drag the hose across the entire yard, blast the poop up with the spray nozzle, rake it, and spray again and rake again. It's a pain in the rear!

I'm investing in some sand. I'm glad I read about another posters experience with putting sand over the pea gravel. I would have done the same if I hadn't read this! Looks like I have myself a project. I vote NO on Pea Gravel!

 

[twochix]

Here are a few photos that show how my run looks after about a year of using sand in it. No complaints here!:

 

[twochix]

Your coop looks awesome for more than one reason. I didn't get to read the entire that but my question was did you also put down gravel first?

 

[ADozenGirlz]

Your coop looks awesome for more than one reason. I didn't get to read the entire that but my question was did you also put down gravel first?

No, no gravel. It would mix with the sand and be a total nightmare to clean and fairly unpleasant to walk on. Plus, you want to be able to roto-till it and pea stones or gravel would make that problematic.

 

[twochix]

So how deep should the sand be? Should I not through scratch down in the run? I posted my dilemma earlier on in the thread that I have some mold in the run. It's covered but still gets moisture in it....right now it is just dirt but will be sand this weekend

 

[ADozenGirlz]

Make it as deep as you can- 8-10" is not too deep.