Well, it has been a few weeks using the Sprouting station and the hens love the fresh greens, grains and having to pick their way though the root mats. I am still not getting close to 70% germination so I'll be looking into that soon.
I know I am having bird issues during the day; doves raiding the shelves for the seeds, but now at night I am hearing the rustling of little rat feet scampering in for the sunflower seeds- In the morning, it looks like they were playing a baseball game with all the shelled husks lying about. So changes were needed.
We started out by JoAnn making a mini bamboo deck for leveling out the station
I made a simple 2" x 2" wood frame to fit the shelf unit inside.
I added some window screening to the inner frame and is for keeping the fruit flies out, the outer metal hardware cloth I added to the outside is for keeping the rats out.
I also changed out the two way valve on the re-circ pump and connected the tubing directly to the pump and got 30% more pressure.
Took the emitter caps off for better flow.
Set the timer to run for 5 minutes every three hours to keep the seeds moist. All the trays right now are the 10 x 20 seed flats with holes for drainage.
This is still an re-circulation system so I will be changing over to a direct water feed/drain system this week. It shouldn't have any effect on seed soak times, but should go a long way to keep the odors away.
I know I am having bird issues during the day; doves raiding the shelves for the seeds, but now at night I am hearing the rustling of little rat feet scampering in for the sunflower seeds- In the morning, it looks like they were playing a baseball game with all the shelled husks lying about. So changes were needed.
We started out by JoAnn making a mini bamboo deck for leveling out the station
I made a simple 2" x 2" wood frame to fit the shelf unit inside.
I added some window screening to the inner frame and is for keeping the fruit flies out, the outer metal hardware cloth I added to the outside is for keeping the rats out.
I also changed out the two way valve on the re-circ pump and connected the tubing directly to the pump and got 30% more pressure.
Took the emitter caps off for better flow.
Set the timer to run for 5 minutes every three hours to keep the seeds moist. All the trays right now are the 10 x 20 seed flats with holes for drainage.
This is still an re-circulation system so I will be changing over to a direct water feed/drain system this week. It shouldn't have any effect on seed soak times, but should go a long way to keep the odors away.
Have a great day and God Bless! 
