Washingtonians

[FirewifeJess]

Quote:
Agreed, you're nice!!! I'm sure that guy will love his new flock

 

[Hilatious]

http://kippenjungle.nl/breeds/selectbreeds.html

How cool is this? It's an id key for chicken breeds.

Nice link

 

[Stumpfarmer]

Also, looking for advice/recommendations. I need to buy a large-wheeled hand truck with a good-sized flat foot; I've got a small folding one, but the wheels are too small to navigate the shallow steps of my front walk. It also creaks alarmingly if the load exceeds 50 pounds. I've looked at HD and Harbor Freight and... the quality of the welds disturbs me.


Any wisdom to communicate?

I have one of the Blue ones from HFT. I have used and abused it for many years. It has held up very well and I have really put it to the test with a lot of verry heavy stuff. 

Yeah, that's the one I was looking at but the welds on the back of the framing were really sloppy (I've spent a lot of time shopping for bicycles in my life, so I may be too picky about that)? I can barely-almost-maybe afford that one, should look at it again.

 

[Nikki99]

Quote: My coop's not so big, so I use a sand box under their roost for easy poop scooping. I haven't had chickens long enough to have formed a real opinion on a lot of things, but I am trying the deep litter method in my run, which has a dirt floor, and so far it's working great, I fluff/stir it up and add some shavings once a week. I just pulled an all-nighter writing a paper, so I'm in explaining/rambling mode...so here's my take on the science of why deep litter works and why I chose to try it for myself.

First, a little background. I have a lot of fish and I've noticed fish and chickens have one thing in common...both make a lot of ammonia and ammonia is bad for them. In my fishtanks, what keeps the ammonia from harming my fish is my filter, and what the filter provides is water flow over an aerobic space for beneficial bacteria to live. These bacteria convert the ammonia to nitrites, then other beneficial bacteria turn the nitrites to nitrates. The bacteria can live in both water and land (but need a surface to attach to), and will naturally populate a filter over time as long as they have a little ammonia to feed on, a sponge to cling to and proper oxygen flow (provided by the moving water). If I were to change my filter media every week, my fish would quickly die of ammonia poisoning unless I also did daily water changes to manually remove the waste they're secreting. Big pain in the butt..with the bacterial conversion, the colony grows to a size the ammonia can sustain, so it's self regulating and my ammonia and nitrite readings are always zero, but it does take about a month to get this bacterial cycle established which is one reason so many people have dead and sick fish when they first start keeping them. I still need to change the water periodically to remove the nitrates, but I can do that once or twice a month without the fish taking any damage since it's a much less harmful substance (and why fishtank water and chicken compost make plants grow well...straight ammonia burns, but once converted to nitrate, it's great fertilizer.)

I see my chicken run as a similar biological system. The chickens are providing a constant source of ammonia, and if I keep the bedding fluffy, those bacteria have a nice aerobic place to live and convert the ammonia to less harmful substances as it's deposited, so if I stick my face down in the bedding (ended up that way last week trying to make the run more secure) there's only an earthy compost smell. I refresh the bedding to help keep it from getting compacted, and if water were to spill, I'd pull that out and add fresh dry stuff...but I always leave enough of the old bedding to help inoculate the new with the good bacteria so the colony doesn't have to completely start over, just play a little catch up. If I were pulling everything out every week, a few bacteria in nature would try to start over every week on a sterile bed, and given the length of time it takes for the bacteria to establish a good colony, it's just not gonna happen so the run gets stinky and has to be sterilized week after week and in the meantime the chickens are stuck breathing it until I have the time to catch up on the cleaning. I figure why make extra work for myself when nature has a better handle on waste management than I do anyway?

So yes, so far, it's working for me. Also, I live on top of a hill with good drainage, my run has great ventilation, and between my weekly additions the chickens do a pretty good job of keeping things stirred up, so those are some factors that help keep it from getting muddy and gross. Also, knowing that it takes some time to get the bacterial colony going, if I were to try it in a coop with less ventilation, I'd be concerned about an initial ammonia build-up. To counter that I'd probably do a modified version at first, pulling out at least half of the bedding and replacing with new (I'm thinking at least weekly or as needed...if you can smell the ammonia, it's needed) to try and keep the ammonia levels down for the girls, but leaving enough of the old that the bacterial colonies have a chance to keep growing, and then once there was no trace at all of the ammonia smell shifting to full blown deep litter.

Just my thoughts, I know different folks have different strokes and that's fine too.

Justahannah, I love how you laid this out! Nice job!
I haven't had my chickens very long either, and they've only been in their permanent house since July. We are also doing the DL method with a dirt floor. So far, it's working really well. I also rake the shavings around to get them fluffed up and rotated every few days/as needed and sprinkle DE all around too. We have good ventilation as well and I haven't noticed much of a smell at all. I don't keep their water inside with them because the ducks throw it everywhere and soak the shavings to the ground so I nixed that real quick! I don't have a poop board under the roost yet, but that's our next project.
Someone on this forum posted a really good article awhile back (during the summer) that was really informative about the DL method, I wish I would've saved it. It included everything from what the DL method is, how to do it, what it does (like you explained w/the bacteria) and why it doesn't work for so many people, (according to this article, it's b/c most people don't do it correctly, they change the litter to often, not giving the bacteria time to do good things).
I also used to have a fresh water tank. It took me forever to figure out why in the world my fish kept dying in a brand new set up. That's when I stopped listening to the "fish" people at petco and petsmart and did my own research. After that, I rarely lost a fish, had the same fish (until we moved from Co. to Wa.) for 5 years, one of which was a gold fish my kids won at the fair. Funny thing about that was that I relied mostly on the filter, doing only partial water changes and keeping ALL chemicles out of my tank!! Worked like a charm!
Anyway, I really liked how you broke this down!

Quote:
Sooty!! That's a cute name! I got a kitten when I was about 4ish as well and my dad and I were sitting on the front porch talking about what we were going to name him. My dad asked me "what should we name the kitty" and apparently I said "I dunno daddy, but we have to name him somethine". So we did, we named him Somethine Kitty.

 

[HoneysuckleHills]

I turn them in to dill pickles! the small ones at least
you can pull the plant and hang it upside down in the garage or some place dry and semi warm and they will ripen.

I've got some hanging in my garage now but tomatoes are starting to fall off the vine before turning even a little pink.
What a mess!
Thanks for the recipe!

Jane, I think I'll try fried green tomatoes.
Gotta do something with all these tomatoes!

 

[Chickielady]

There is ONLY one good use for Made in China Cast Iron. Cut it up and make art!!!

It is horrible, and knowing what we know about Chinese materials, it more than likely has 'off' or toxic metal in it.

 

[Chickielady]

Saw this for SF :::::

http://www.qcsupply.com/30515-multi-purpose-muck-cart.html

 

[Imp]

Quote:
Fried Green Tomatoes-

 

[Chickielady]

I should probably start calling the rooster Rodney because he gets no respect.

They pick and scratch at him when he tries to bathe, they steal his food, and they've booted him from the top of his roosting ladder.

Great name !!!!!!!!!

 

[Chickielady]

I have a meat hammer, flat on one side and the usual nubs on the other for tenderizing meat. The tool is handy for making jerky, cubed steak, etc. I wish I had a tenderizer also.

I am watching the tenderizer (makes cube steaks) at my dennis Co.....just after deer/elk season, prices DROP dramatically.