Show me your solutions for a muddy mucky chicken yard!

[Cotton Hill Chick]

How big is the mud area you're dealing with currently?
Is any part of it covered?
For a temporary fix, you can sacrifice a plywood sheet or two (or even some pallets) and pile the straw or shavings on top. They'll still scratch it around but at least it won't get all muddy, it worked for me before I made my permanent fix. You can also add lots of additional perches so they can get their feet dry. Mud is not a healthy environment for chickens.

I'm so stranger to mud or standing water, and I've tried all manner of remedies, but when you live in an area with a 6+ month rainy season.... not every "solution" works. At one point I even had water flooding into my covered areas.

I think a very key factor is having a gutter and directing the water away. The runoff from even a small roof can be quite significant and will puddle next to your coop or run and probably flood into it. I have a rain chain and collection bucket with a hose that leads to my garden beds. A french drain could help for other areas that aren't affected by roof runoff. I use pine shaving in my covered run, and before my gutter was installed it did flood in there and the pine shavings were slippery and gross. I can't imagine if direct rainfall poured on it all winter.

So for my narrow uncovered chicken yard, I use a very thick layer of wood chips. But you've already experienced your chickens scratching the bedding and mixing it with mud below and I've seen wood chips just sink away and disappear over a short time as well. Then I found this idea: Mud Management and copied it. When the ground is reasonably dry, you need to level it and cover it with a barrier, I used pvc poultry netting. This isn't meant to be a predator proofing, just a means to keep the wood chips from sinking and keep chickens from mixing the chips and the mud together. I didn't want to use wire fencing for the barrier because I've seen it rust and deteriorate with prolonged exposure to the ground and that could hurt my chickens if they scratched it.
View attachment 1765538 View attachment 1765539 View attachment 1765540

This is a close up after one year, and in the middle of the "mud" season:
View attachment 1765541 Can you see the mud? Me neither!

The rain rinses most of the poo and chickens turn it regularly and also make some pretty deep potholes, so I have to rake it level every so often.
View attachment 1765542

Wow, wonderful pictures and thanks for them and your description! I have indeed found a source for free wood chips from the town. I've mucked out the old straw (yuck) and have a few loads of chips down (what fits in containers in the back of my car - slow going!). The chips are MUCH better already; although as you note, the chickens scratch them into the mud. Plus, an ADDITIONAL CHALLENGE in our chix yard is a slight slope, so it all goes downhill toward the fence! LOL! Raking it back up periodically, good exercise. You mention roof runoff, yes that would be substantial and a gutter is a great idea, I will look into moving that source out of the main yard. Not much under cover yet; DH has a plan to build a covering structure for part of the yard... its on the list. I DO need good earthwork to enhance drainage too... clay soils here so nothing much drains and it just turns to squishy walking. I've begun to move around the space with an edger tool, just making small channels to begin to interrupt the water a bit; every little bit helps I hope! Thanks again for your description and photos! Big help!

 

[Cotton Hill Chick]

Get some aged wood chippings from tree trimming....
...or go to the big box store and get a few bags of uncolored mulch.
Smaller stuff like straw, dry grass clippings, pine shavings, dry leaves, dry pine straw, can be part of it... but the big chunks of wood are most important

Then get this fixed:

Indeed! Love the photos, thank you. That's some deep litter! I'm getting the idea from you, and others, that the big chunks of wood are key. I've found a free source of chipping from the town, so as much and as fast as I can haul it, it will come!

Get some aged wood chippings from tree trimming....
...or go to the big box store and get a few bags of uncolored mulch.
Smaller stuff like straw, dry grass clippings, pine shavings, dry leaves, dry pine straw, can be part of it... but the big chunks of wood are most important

Then get this fixed:

 

[Cotton Hill Chick]

Hi!

I put linoleum down in the bottom of my coop, and for the run, I just leave it dirt and weeds from our garden, or other organic matter.


I can relate with all this horrible rain! All winter in New Jersey, we got rain storm after rain storm! The water in our goat pen was so high that we had to build a boardwalk for them to walk on! Crazy!

Thankfully, we had two sump pumps to keep our basement dry and clear of water.

Hope you find a good solution!

Yes, thank you! I"m glad you've been able to keep the basement dry. The rain sure has been crazy this year... hope we all get a nice break of dry, sunny weather. The chickens sure do like it when the yard dries out enough to sprawl around in! I'm getting great ideas from everyone, so with a new-found free source of wood chips, looks like I've got a good start.

 

[Cotton Hill Chick]

I use the deep litter method. Start with tree trimming wood chips 3 - 4 inches deep, if you can't get them, use untreated mulch. To that add dried leaves pieces of thick and thin tree branches, yard and garden waste when available, pine needles, some straw. What you want to accomplish is a nice mix of different stuff, this will keep everything loose. The poop will filter down through the litter, decompose, not give off bad odors and will not draw flies. Add more stuff as you get it, to keep it freshened up.

Here's mine after adding yard and garden waste, before the chickens got to it. My run is covered, but this method also works with an uncovered run.

View attachment 1765021

Nice! Thanks for you reply and the photo. I'd not thought about adding other stuff, dry stuff, over top of the basic wood chips. Make sense, and it would add interest for the chickens too!

 

[Cotton Hill Chick]

We've been getting truck loads of wood chips free from the town so thats what my secure run is. It's probably about 4 or 5 inches deep & its holding up fine in all this rain, but it is covered. I throw handfuls of leaves & dried plants & things in & I throw scratch out there too so they move it all around & keep it fresh. You know a chicken can't resist a pile of leaves!

Ah, I envy yours (and others) covered runs! DH has to build one on the "to do" list. I've found a source of free wood chips from the town (yay!) so the limitation is how fast I can haul them up in containers in the back of my car! What I've added to the uncovered run so far, has definitely helped. I'm no where near the 3-4 inches yet, but will keep on hauling until I get a good foundation! Come on, sunny days!

 

[Cotton Hill Chick]

Either deep litter, keep adding organic matter, or raise it up with gravel or sand. For outside I prefer the deep litter.

I'm heading toward deep(er) litter, as I've found a free source of wood chips from the town. Thanks for your reply!

 

[Cotton Hill Chick]

It gets wet alot here (HI) ... Researched what to do for ground cover, I was leaning towards sand until a Member reminded me it gets hard & heavy when wet. She recommended DLM. We have no access to lumber mills like you all, so I went with shavings that I can purchase at Dels/TSC. It's working great but during our hurricane last summer it got nasty & the ground was really wicking water, had a stream & puddles.

This year I'm trying the horse pellets; compressed sawdust, I think. We just went though weeks of rain but no flooding. However a section on the coop was getting pretty wet. So I raked back the shavings, added the pellets at dusk & covered with the shavings. The next morning, the pellets absorbed the water which the chickens mixed into the shavings. I just added more shavings if it got too wet. I was planning on shoveling out the wet sawdust but they got it before me.

I used straw years ago but when wet, it got to be a tangled mess. Read where someone had an old greenhouse with pack gravel floor what was the best. It's harder when the dirt starts wicking the wetness, that's when I have issues so I'm watching to see what more is said about ground covering. Although I'm 100% into my modified DLM ... I just keep adding shavings & about 2x a year I remove the scratched up dirt/shavings to use as ground cover out back.

That's interesting to add the pellets, I will look into that for sure. I've got a source of free wood chips from the town, so that has helped a great deal. More work to do... DH has a plan to build a covered run over part so that will help when it manifests!

 

[CaramelKittey]

Yes, thank you! I"m glad you've been able to keep the basement dry. The rain sure has been crazy this year... hope we all get a nice break of dry, sunny weather. The chickens sure do like it when the yard dries out enough to sprawl around in! I'm getting great ideas from everyone, so with a new-found free source of wood chips, looks like I've got a good start.

Hi!

That’s great! I’m so glad that you found a solution! Hopefully you can say Good-bye to all that rain soon!

 

[Red-Stars-in-RI]

My son's cub scout pack did a clean-up at a historic cemetery that's on the Memorial Day parade route yesterday.

I got a couple of hours of exercise out of it...and a truck full of leaves and grass clippings. This should help keep the muck in the run down (and provide a few green treats for the flock)!

 

[Cotton Hill Chick]

View attachment 1784516

My son's cub scout pack did a clean-up at a historic cemetery that's on the Memorial Day parade route yesterday.

I got a couple of hours of exercise out of it...and a truck full of leaves and grass clippings. This should help keep the muck in the run down (and provide a few green treats for the flock)!

What a wonderful activity, and a fantastic haul of stuff for the chickens! I love it.