What to put in the nesting boxes?

[229Mick]

So six of my first batch of eight survived and are out in the coop that I inherited from my nephew's late flock. I saw an article recommending sand for the coop floor, which is working really well. I can clean the poop up easily with a cat litter scooper, and they can scratch to their hearts content without clearing any of the floor.

My only concern as they are getting big enough to get up to the nesting boxes is that my nephew tells me that his chickens always tossed the hay out of the boxes. Is there any better option than hay? I still have a lot of the pin shavings I used when they were little but I'm not sure that would be any different from the hay.

Anybody got any input on what the best option is here?

Thanks all!

Mick

 

[BellaBokBok]

Saw dust or hay or straw
they shouldn't kick out the bedding if you put something like a lip at the bottom of the opening

 

[PeepsAreForMe]

My girls will be laying any day so I put pine shavings in their nest boxes - it has about 2 - 3" lip at the front. They pushed it all out. Then pooped in them! I think they slept in them. I even put a fake egg in there.

 

[Ridgerunner]

People use straw, hay, grass trimmings, wood shavings, shredded paper, Spanish moss, carpet, and who knows what else, all successfully. It's not so much what you use it's how you use it. I personally like straw or long grass trimmings, but that is not a law of nature with the world as we know it changing if something different is used. It is simply my personal preference.

I find that if I put a lip across the bottom maybe 5" high, the nesting material is not scratched out. Many hens rearrange the nesting material before they lay. If you don't have a sufficient lip, they can and will scratch out any nesting material you use, any fake eggs, or any real eggs other hens have already laid.

 

[carolinasculpture]

Hi! I have been using nest box mats. They are like grey AstroTurf, no scattered chips and super easy to clean if they need it. Also seems to harbor less bugs and stuff. Will never go back to chips or straw. Good luck!
Edited to add, got them from FarmTek.

 

[weekendhomestea]

PeepsAreForMe,

Are your nest boxes higher or the same height as your perch/roost? The nest boxes need to be lower than the perch or else the chickens will sleep in them.

I use about 4 inches of pine shavings in my nest boxes and it works well for me. I've never had a problem with the chickens tossing it out of the nest box.

-RDG

 

[229Mick]

PeepsAreForMe,

Are your nest boxes higher or the same height as your perch/roost? The nest boxes need to be lower than the perch or else the chickens will sleep in them.

I use about 4 inches of pine shavings in my nest boxes and it works well for me. I've never had a problem with the chickens tossing it out of the nest box.

-RDG

I think we may have found the design flaw! The boxes are higher, so they may be spending more tiem in them than they should? I'll have to look and ways to redesign...

Thanks all for the input! Very helpful.

Mick

 

[Casey207908]

I agree, put a lip on the front that is approx 3" higher than the nesting box itself. I put pine shavings in the boxes, everytime the chickens go in to lay they scratch it around and personalize their nesting space before they lay down. The lip on the front allows them to scratch around without kicking all the material out. I also hung burlap over each laying box, they like their privacy when they are laying. The burlap over the front to give some privacy was the ticket to get my chickens laying in the boxes. Good luck

 

[dogsuckchickensrule]

this is what i did i used a table saw and ripped some deck board its fully adjustable to go down for cleaning it just shovels evenly to the ground and goes up to about 4 inches to keep sawdust in.

 

[229Mick]

OK, I think I have two problem, and I want to see what you think of them and their priority...
First the nesting boxes are higher than the roosting post. It sounds like the post should be the highest thing? With the way the nesting boxes are built and built in to the coop, I'm expecting they'd be at least marginally difficult to move down. If nothing else, the doors to access the boxes would need to move, so I'd likely need to replace the entire outside walls on left and right.
The other issue is that the nesting boxes are too shallow on the inside. Having only a 1x4 piece of lumber as the inside wall.

I'm confident that the second problem is easy to take care of even by just getting a 1x8 plank or something like that to keep the chickens from knocking out the straw or whatever I end up putting in the boxes. So I guess the question is, how big a deal is it that the nesting boxes are higher than the roosting post? I want it to be right, but I don't want to do major reconstruction if it's not a big deal.

Thoughts?

Mick