Sunni_Chick
Chirping
I am also a new chicken momma and understand your concerns with "what to use in the run?" questions - I have mulled over the same questions/concerns and feel this is trial by error as we go along. We just finished our run (12X24) and have 14 chickens that are 11 weeks and 12 weeks (by 3 day difference). I bought the Chicks Dig It Premium Chicken Sand and used a ton of it. 120+ bags to be specific. I'm happy with it "so far" but it is a chore to clean the run every evening -- easier when I can do it in the morning and the evening if I'm honest. It has virtually no dust but then I did add some First Saturday Lime on top of it so now it is a tad dusty but nothing major. Sifts easily and since our run is covered, it has been a blessing in this heat wave we are in. There is a 10 degree difference in the run vs the yard thanks to the shade/sand combination.
We will be adding gutters to the run once we get the coop itself finished and I'm hoping that will help us keep the sand dry - it currently gets wet from the rain splashing off the roof and onto the ground - but it does not clump or become hard and I will say it dries quickly...gutters will be more helpful once we get in the colder temps I'm sure. Plus we will be putting in a few "tree limbs" for the birds to perch on in the cooler weather and will be wrapping the run as well when we get closer to the steady cool temps.
The only thing that we did that I am starting to regret was putting in the "fodder boxes" - they are covered with hardware cloth so we can grow alfalfa, oats, wheatgrass and marigolds but they cannot deroot everything. But man do they smell terrible because they poop on the top of the screen and I can only wash it down through the HW cloth since I can't scoop it off. So those might be coming out in the near future. We will see.
We will be adding gutters to the run once we get the coop itself finished and I'm hoping that will help us keep the sand dry - it currently gets wet from the rain splashing off the roof and onto the ground - but it does not clump or become hard and I will say it dries quickly...gutters will be more helpful once we get in the colder temps I'm sure. Plus we will be putting in a few "tree limbs" for the birds to perch on in the cooler weather and will be wrapping the run as well when we get closer to the steady cool temps.
The only thing that we did that I am starting to regret was putting in the "fodder boxes" - they are covered with hardware cloth so we can grow alfalfa, oats, wheatgrass and marigolds but they cannot deroot everything. But man do they smell terrible because they poop on the top of the screen and I can only wash it down through the HW cloth since I can't scoop it off. So those might be coming out in the near future. We will see.
