Using sand in the run

[Morbidia]

After reading advice on here about using sand I thought I would give it a try and i have to say its a brilliant idea. I have tried so many different ways of managing mud in my run and have just not been able to find any that work. I have only had the sand down for three days and already I can see the advantages of using it. Its been raining for weeks here in the uk and my garden and run were turning into a smelly boggy mess, I put down some weed control membrane then piled sand on top and its working really well , its much easier to clean the run out now and my hens love digging about in it too. I also put down a gravel path around the outside of the coop and run so I have a mud free path to walk on, this also helps to drain the rain away from my clay soil. We have severe weather warning this weekend and are supposed to be getting a months worth of rain tonight so that will be a true test of my new runs capabilties, its a covered run so shouldn't get wet hopefully.

 

[ChickensAreSweet]

Yes, sand helps greatly with mud. I always buy 4 bags of sand every winter to apply to my pathways in the run to waterers and the coop.

A month's worth of rain- ugh.

 

[Erin~TheChickenLover]

I use sand, too, and I love it. It's also useful if you make a "sand box" to go under the roosts to catch the poop. I'm about to build one for my laying flock. I wish we could get some rain here. It's not rained in...well, I can't even remember the last time it rained.

 

[Morbidia]

I was lucky that one ofmy neighbours had 6 bags of sand she wanted to get rid of so I used that, then I went to our local Tesco superstore and they were selling play sand cheap so I bought 8 bags of that to top it up with I plan on buying a couple of bags a month to keep it topped up

 

[Morbidia]

We had a wild night laast night, the rain was unbelievable, My run was water logged this morning despite being covered, the ground is just soaking ,the sand is now soaked through

I went out and cleaned all the poop up and raked it and it is wet through now, we have a severe flood warning tonight so it looks like more rain to come, there is flooding everywhere with one of our major motorways closed due to a crack in a bridge, so far we have been lucky here and missed the floods but lots of people haven't been so lucky