What about composting?

[Eggscaping]

So...I'm one of these old hippy (before it was chic) tree-hugger type people who does recycling and composting and worm-composting and so on and so on. Here in Portland, all we do is have one of those large "revolving" type compost bins that you can screw a lid on and rotate every day or so for our non-meat food type garbage.
But when we move down to Lakeside, I had a mind to having a compost type situation either in or near the chicken coop/run. So we could let the chickens get out to scratch through it and maybe a half of the run could be set up so that it could hold some compost...rotating with the other half.
But then the thought came to me that there may be bears in the woods around Lakeside...it's quite forested. There are black bears in the area.
Do the rest of you have any particular way/s that you deal with compost piles if you have bears around? We have raccoons here and they can't get into the plastic bins...but a bear could.

 

[rosemarythyme]

Probably depends on the bear, but I have bears and never had them try to get in the compost bins or bother the chickens (knock on wood). My in laws aren't very far away and had a bear sitting on their porch for hours, he also made no attempt to get into their open compost but did empty all their bird feeders.

The only real deterrent to a bear is an electric fence.

 

[Folly's place]

Only electric fencing will keep bears out, and some will be happy to eat your chickens, their eggs, and feed, after demolishing the coop. I'd be adding electric in bear country!
There's no reason to not give your birds kitchen scraps, edible scraps, not moldy stuff.
Mary

 

[Egghead_Jr]

Our bears don't mess with the compost piles but other animals do. Just keep it away from the chicken coop. And never leave chicken feeders out overnight. That will attract bear and other critters. Most chickens taken by bear were baited in with chicken feeders left out and when the bears are done with that put attention on tearing a wall off coop to eat the birds too.

I don't use electric around chickens but must use it around my bee hives. Compost and bees are away from chickens. Feed for birds is in run for daylight hours only.

 

[IdyllwildAcres]

My coop is my compost heap, I have dirt floors and throw everything in there to compost. Black gold.

Gary

 

[cmom]

We live on several acres and do have compost not far from the coops. I have never had any critter destroy the piles.