What bedding do you use? - POLL

[r709shackleford]

I was wondering this too, hopefully we get an answer (since this thread is kind of old). I'm thinking maybe its a dirt floor coop?

I have thin sheet metal down in my coop. I think 12 or 16 gauge. It works great for scraping, and all goes right out the poop slot. Easy so far! But I noticed frost build up in the corners and along walls where the walls meet. Also, frost near the bottom of my coop where the walls butt into the floor. Seems like all this moisture will eventually take a toll on the new coop building.

Note; I am in a very cold climate. Alaska! My cool has ventilation issues.

 

[Dentaku]

I use peat. It's fairly common as a bedding here in Sweden for household poultry as well as horses and cows. My hens love it and i really like it to; it's easy to clean, long lasting and smells nice. The only minus is that it can be a bit dusty.

I know that sustainability often is an issue with peat. However, living in Sweden where actually more peat was regrown than what was harvested in the year 2000 and where peat makes out a total of 15% of the country surface it really doesn't seem like such a bad alternative after all. Here in Europe peat is actually considered a slowly renewable source of energy and not a fossil fuel.

 

[Azriel]

I use a mix of bedding. I do DL in my coop, and only clean it once a year. When I built my coop, I did not put a floor in it. I remember hating cleaning the coop every spring with its wood floor when I was a kid, so I knew I didn't want to do that. So after reading a lot of older books on chicken coops, I decided on a dirt floor. I love it. I get shredded paper free from work, and straw free from my grain fields, so I mix both with pine shavings. I start out with 2 bags of pine shavings in the 12x12 area, put 2 big bags of paper on top of that, then maybe 1/2 to 3/4 of a bale of straw on top of it all. The girls love to dig through it to find left over grain in the straw. I toss a few hand fulls of scratch on the floor daily, and the girls keep the bedding well turned, and I add new bedding every few weeks as needed. When I cleaned the coop this fall, I could not tell what was old bedding and what was dirt it had composted so well. What I took out of the coop was put into the part of the garden that I will be planting next year and was tilled under.If I get a bit of a chicken smell when I open it up in the morning I just put down a little new shavings, but I have never had a poop smell.

 

[schmockl]

We use pine shavings in the coop and nest boxes.

 

[cravenchx]

We use pine shavings in the coop and nest boxes.

Where do you get your pine shavings?

 

[schmockl]

We get them from a local that does rough lumber planing. He sells the bags by the honor system and you can go any day of the week at any time. Very convenient.

 

[JacobMaxwell]

I'm very lucky! I get shavings completely free from a sawmill about 20 minutes drive from my house. I just have to pick a dry time of year, then I stock up on the shavings. During the summer I fill three large garbage bags with shavings. When winter is coming, I fill six.

 

[LittleBits]

I just cleaned out the coop (again) and took all the old straw out. I left it with a bare floor. Our roosts are about 2 - 2 1/2 feet off the ground so it doesn't seem too much to land on the hard floor.

The straw just gets wasted, though I do put it on the compost pile. I built a 2-nest duplex for them to lay eggs in (15 chickens) and pulled out the old nesting spots which were also covered in straw (and poop!). I put shredded paper in the nesting spots. They all had to check it out pretty close, stretching those necks up and peeking inside! ( I really have more fun than they do, watching them!!)

Am thinking about building some poop boards for under the little roosts and putting in PDZ, as I've learned on here to do. Seems to keep the coop cleaner, odor-free, and easy to scoop! Coop is only 6x6 and the roosts and duplex take up some of that space...

Not sure what to put on the floor - any suggestions for a coop this size? Needs to be economical and easy to clean with low dust.

Have a questions about the run - if I put in all my grass clippings from the yard, won't these mold and thus be bad for my chickens? Or do they turn it enough that it won't mold that fast?

I did this and then a few days later, took it all out because I thought the mold might be a problem. They loved wallowing in it, though!

Thanks again for all suggestions and comments!

 

[MerkySky]

Straw is what I am using only because we own a landscaping business and we have quite a lot on hand. I do fine that I need to change it often. But as of now I am only using it on the floor of my coop on the inside. They get to go out in the run during the day which is grass and we move it about. I do not have nest boxes up yet still trying to decide on which ones to use. So I am not sure what to use in the nest boxes. When the chickens were chicks I kept them in large rabbit cages with newspaper that I had to change every day and even so when I finally moved them to their coop I had to power wash the cages to get the dried on newspaper off. So I am not a fan of news paper. The chickens loved it they shredded it.
But I am a newbi with chickens so that is all I have to offer on my experience.

 

[hotcurltr]

I use several bags of shavings on the floor of the coop and put hay or straw over because I don't like the dust. The straw and hay are easy to rake out everyday and the shavings keep it warm and dry. I have never tried sand but think I will, since there are so many positive reviews. I also like the idea of the horse bedding pellets which I use on my horses occasionally , although I'm mostly a straw person. The dust from shavings bothers me if I lay down with them so I figure it probably does them also. Since my chickens free range during the day I don't use anything but nature outside the coop. On my young I use an enclosed top and bottom tractor I move around until I feel like they are old enough to go with the others, I am very, very new at this so I just joined backyard chickens and any other site to learn what to do and get great ideas from others. Thanks everyone for the great info.