Feeding advice for bantams (one broody, one moulting)

[emmamakeup]

Hi everyone

 

On Sunday I pulled out all the wood chips in the run as it was completed mudded up with all the rain we've been having and it didn't smell too good either (we've had it in about 2 months now). I didn't like the idea of my girls getting mudded up and walking around on a not so clean ground so I've not replaced it. Instead I thought every other day I'll rake out the poo and make it a clean area for them to scratch on. They seem happy but would you leave it as is or would you replace it with some more chippings or other materials?

[chickencam]

It can be difficult. I like mine to have something to dig in, so mine are on a thick bed of bark chips. We only change these after a month to six weeks then only the top layer then put in some fresh.

[Olly]

I gave up on bark chips quite early on.

 

Mine are on more or less bare earth now - if you keep the run covered it doesn't turn to mud, although I do add aubiose it sort of disappears after a bit. They seem entirely happy and healthy with this!

[emmamakeup]

Liz/Olly - cheers for your replies.

 

Yeah they are on bare ground now and seem quite happy. Auboise - doesn't it fly around the garden?

[Clare L]

We have only had our girls for a few weeks, we had them on bare earth, which was fine, but when we had a few days of really heavy rain it became a muddy bath, which really started to smell and could not tell poo from mud so no chance of poo picking (and we had a cover over it!). We scaped out all the mud and then put some Auboise on the top which really did help. It does not smell at all now and seems to keep dry and is great for poo picking. We did have to put up some wood/skirting around of the edge of the run or they just kicked it out when they were scratching around. But it has not blown around or anything.

[emmamakeup]

Thanks Clare

 

Yeah i'm quite pursuaded to get some auboise. We have a wooden edging around the run with wood chips on the outside of the run as we've just let that there because it looks quite nice and clean. We bought a large cover type thing from a shop in town which we've adapted to go over the run when it gets pretty bad rainwise but will probably use this towards the winter time.

 

Do you completely coat the floor of the run in auboise or just a sprinkle? Where do you tend to go for it? Mail order or local supplier?

[Clare L]

Do you completely coat the floor of the run in auboise or just a sprinkle? Where do you tend to go for it? Mail order or local supplier?

 

After we first went from mud to auboise we only put down a small layer, after a week this had been throughly mixed with the remainder of the mud/soil, so we took it all out and put down about 2 inches I suppose. This has kept really well. I did not want to put down much more, because if it did get wet then there is not too much replace and I would rather keep it topped up if needed.

 

The bale cost just about £10 from a local tack shop and we still have about half of it left, so it went further than I thought it would.

 

We got a winter cover from Omlet, so when it is wet, we have the winter shade over one side and the top and the summer shade covers the other side. We also have a piece of corregated plastic over the top. Hopefully it wont get too wet in the future

[emmamakeup]

Mmmm - might give it a go. If this summer was a little better it would be helpful

 

Cheers for your help on this