Washing the dust out of a sand run

[azygous]

Has anyone tried to wash the dust out of the sand in their run?

I like the sandy substrate and its ease in keeping clean. But it's becoming dustier as time goes by. I've developed chronic bronchitis from it, and my chickens often sneeze. There's a fine layer of dust on everything in the enclosed run. In summer, the run has open sides with more ventilation, however.

I bought some dust binder to try to spray on it, but am hesitant that it might be harmful, even though it's made with natural ingredients and it is supposed to be safe for chickens when dry. The product is called Dustlocker. Is anyone familiar with it?

As an alternative, I was thinking about hosing down the sand real good as soon as it gets warm. Will the dust particles sink to the lower parts? Is there an effective way to do this?

The sand is around three inches deep over dry clay soil, and is ordinary construction sand.

 

[4 the Birds]

I would hose it down or you can even use a watering can to sprinkle and moisten. I don't use sand but maybe add pine chips over top? Perhaps a coarser sand added on top? I'm not sure if you rake it daily so if you do then the wood chips may not to ideal. I often wear a dust mask when I spread straw but the wood chips don't bother me. Dust is hard to combat since chickens scratch and kick up everything. Not sure about the binder idea.

 

[chfite]

I would hose it down well or let it rain on it. I use river sand and have not noticed any dust.

Chris

 

[azygous]

I'm going to try hosing it down now that it's getting warmer here. I didn't want to add any moisture during the sub-freezing winter months because of the high risk of frost bite. It's an enclosed run, completely in winter with plastic panels over the sides, which makes the dust worse since circulating air can't settle and blow away the dust in the air. It doesn't rain or snow on the run since it's got a roof over it.

I wanted to know if anyone has attempted this, and what I can expect. I've sprinkled the run during the hot summer months to make things cooler, but I haven't tried actually soaking the sand to try to get the dust particles out of the sand.

I tried searching for methods to do this and all I came up with were huge river sand quarry-type operations.

 

[azygous]

I also meant to ask if anyone has used odor removing enzymatic solutions on the soil in their run? One thing that concerns me is the foul odor I'll be creating by wetting the sand with all the microscopic dried fecal matter mixed in.

One product I have on hand is Out! Oxy-Fast Odor Remover, and another is Odo-Kill concentrated deodorizer that you mix in water and spray onto the contaminated soil.

Since chickens ingest the sand, I hesitate to treat it with any chemical that might hurt them. The first product is a hydrogen peroxide solution, and it is probably safe. The other I'm not so sure of, since it's got alkyl dimethyl benzylammonium chloride in it.

Any chemists out there?

 

[kuntrygirl]

I didn't realize that sand had dust. I have never seen any dust with having sand at my place.

 

[c2chicks]

For odor try Sweet PDZ. Its' a natural horse stall refresher that neutralizes the ammonia smell. It's completely safe and compostable. There are many threads about Sweet PDZ here on BYC. I throw some around once /week-ish when it's wet, NO smell.

 

[jewels621]

X2 on the PDZ!

 

[azygous]

They don't sell PDZ here. But thanks for suggesting it.