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AJuff

What to do with the poop?

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I kept my hens in the same run for six months on woodchip on top of the existing pea gravel. I moved them onto a fresh site during the week for fear of foul sick ground but they have extra access to that ground.

 

I now have an 8.5m x 2.5m area of very thick gungy woodchips and gravel and lots of poo. :vom: Should I

a) clear the whole area, get rid of it and put down Easibed (it is not a covered run)

b) Just keep them off it altogether and hope it washes clean in the rain over the next few months.

c) Put topsoil on it and grow grass on top of it for a hen playground.

d) ??????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????

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You could dig some garden lime into it if your chooks are not going back on it straight away. That will neutralise the soil. If you want to dig it up and start again and you can't fit it all in your compost bin it's ok to dig it directly into any fruit and veg beds as it's great fertiliser (fruit bushes in particular thrive on it!). As long as you put a layer of soil on top it shouldn't be smelly.

 

If you are going to go with Jo's excellent suggestion and use sand, your run ideally needs to be covered, although it doesn't matter if it gets a little bit damp. I've been using some play sand in my run and it works well (50kg for £5 from good old Wilko!). It has to be horticultural grade sand as they will ingest some of it while they are scratching around, although it doesn't matter if it's sharp sand, silver sand or play sand.

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I guess it would depend on what size garden you have, and how you use the rest of your garden. I will have a similar problem as I have aubios on top of chip bark, which is on top of soil. Although I pick up most of the mess each day , morning and evening, I have the additional problem of rabbits poo being dug in when the rabbits dig.

 

I plan to shovel it all off in a week or two and dig it into a vegetable bed that won't be used for a while. That way next years crops will get the benefit. I will replace with just aubios - but I have a (leaky) roof on my walk in run!

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Our girls are on grass. We move their run daily to a clear patch (we do have quite a lot of grass) and clear the poo into the compost heap.

 

Oddly enough we were only having this conversation this afternoon - how do you clean a permanent run on woodchip? We've decided to nurture our grass as much as possible so I'd opt for "c"

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This topic has got me worried. We have our 4 hens (cube plus 2m) on bark chips on top of soil. They have been since we got them 6 weeks ago. The poo seems to disappear as they scrat about and I have only replaced the bark chips once by clearing away all the old chips and putting 2 bags of fresh down. The run doesn't seem to smell (yet - though I know it hasn't been that warm!) and the hens seem fine. They do free range quite a bit so that helps keep the run reasonably clean I suppose. How on earth does anyone get into a cube run to clean out poo on a daily basis? Where our cube is situated it is not easily moved at all - I had to climb in to clear the last lot of chips out which I am happy to do every 6 weeks or so.

 

I know you aren't supposed to use bark chips but again, our hens seem fine on it and I am not sure how you would use aubiose on top of soil (although I do use it in the droppings tray).

 

Hope I am not doing the wrong thing here and harming my hens!! :?

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