What do you do with your poopy wood chips and bio-security

202roosterlane

Happy Hen on a Harley
12 Years
Feb 24, 2011
2,572
24
276
Central Arkansas
Hi I was wondering what everyone does with there wood chips when they clean out all thier chicken coops? I am huge on bio security so on that thought, my instant reaction was to put them on the burn pile and burn them sameday. My reasoning for this would be that you wood chips gather mites etc as well as disease lingers on your chips.
But I know I personally spray my chips twice month with poultry protector as well use DE.

A friend said to me, "Why don't you put them on your azalea beds?" Hmmmmmmm, now there's a thought. I buy so much mulch every year for my beds to keep down weeds. Please keep in mind, I do not live in a $500,000.00 home in a snob nose community. I live in the country with pretty spead out neighbors. Though in a very nice community. sWell I thought, "My chickens have not been sick. My chickens do not have access to my flower beds. They do not free range. I have no neighbors with chickens for 10 miles. So my question are,

Is chicken urine/waste to strong and will kill any thing in these flower beds (mostly shrubs)?

Would it really stink considering it will be rained and snowed on and break down naturally? (Snow not really an issue in Central AR)

Should it be considered as long as your chickens have not any illness for that time period? Meaning that something that not spread through the air and infect others chickens.

Please look at my Bio-security thread (in my signature line) before deciding so you can see my practices to make a determination. I know it may seem silly and I am suprised I am even considering it. But ONLY if it is safe for the people, animals, my chickens and my shrubs.
 
Yes, it can kill your plants. I have used pure chicken dung from time to time but you have to be careful with how much you use and what you use it on. I recommend allowing the litter to age for a few months before applying it to your beds. When it becomes compost, it makes excellent fertilizer and the wood chips will keep weeds down.

Chicken manure is one of the greatest things in the world.
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It is so easy to compost it, too. I'm lazy, when I compost I don't turn it. I just let it sit in manageable piles and after a while, I use it. lol You can turn it though. OR, get a compost tumbler! Man I want one of those.
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Compost it! This not only kills the microrganisms when allowed to heat up but the result is a wonderful soil amendment/mulch. If you manage to end up with too much, you can always sell it.
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It would depend how long you keep your bedding in coop. Some who use deep litter method have mostly composted dung when they clean out the coop. In that scenario the bedding can go directly to mulching. If your like me and shovel off top layer ever two weeks and add more chips then I'd let your mulch compost for a few weeks before adding to flower beds. As for odor there really isn't any to speak of. If your coop doesn't offend your olfactory neither will the mulch.

Here we compost in a bin I made from wood pallets, usually the chips get tossed and mixed with all else we compost then emptied to garden in spring. Though the bedding this late fall/winter was used on this springs asparagus bed straight from the coop.
 

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