Attach catio to 4 x 4s

[sleepymummy]

Right, a few weeks ago I posted a Can hens get trenchfoot question. You were all really helpful. I went and bought some equine bedding and wood chips but all that does is get mashed into the mud and they are still slopping around. We cannot afford to keep going to buy bags of bedding and endless woodchips. (unless someone

 

My question is am I pandering to them too much? Are they ok? We have a couple of time consuming options still open to us. They aren't inches thick there's just nothing to scratch, it's all slop and will probably stay like that until we get some warm dry weather.

 

So do I leave it as is or are there any other solutions?

[chelsea]

I would leave it to be honest and try not too worry (I know it's hard!). If you compare our chickens with farmyard chickens out there they really are spoilt little madams living the life of luxury!

 

Also we've been very unfortunate with all this wet weather (wettest November on record), hopefully with a crisp dry few weeks it will dry out.

[Redwing]

Its worth seeing if a friendly tree surgeon will drop you off a load of free woodchips

 

Its also worth considering outting some 'refuges' in the run, pallets are good so they can get ot of the mud if they want to

 

Otherwise it may be worth confining them to a roofed or covered run for the winter

 

I wouldnt worry too much though, they will be just fine even if you do nothing

[sjp]

how deep are the woodchips mine are on about 4inch deep chips which are wet but not muddy have had them down since earily August but are due to be changed next week I pay about £4.50 for a 25kg bale from a feed merchant or about £6.50 for easibed wood chips

just make sure the chips from tree surgeons haven't got laurel or ivy in

[Hen Watch]

Do you have moveable housing?

 

In winter my garden is waterlogged, so I move their eglu and run to the patio. It doesn't get waterlogged and I put Auboise down to soak up the poops. Then in Spring they move back to the grass.

[Guest]

we have a covered run, on soil covered with aubiose with a corrugated plastic roof and ours still manages to get really wet and mushy. DH raised the back of the roof yesterday so it's on a slant now and hopefully the rain will run off the roof instead of pooling in the ridges of the roof and dripping through the gaps.

 

This is what it looked like before thw roof alteration (and before the Winter!). As you can see, it's quite sheltered but still gets mushy, I don't think there's much you can do unless you cover the sides with plastic sheeting but then that flaps about in the wind and frightens them

 

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_oOddC9y46xE/Sse_g4sKwKI/AAAAAAAAABk/xPaL9O-EVc0/s1600-h/230908.5.jpg

[Guest]

....

 

Its also worth considering outting some 'refuges' in the run, pallets are good so they can get ot of the mud if they want to

 

.....

 

 

that's good advice, ours have a little storm porch type thing to shelter in, a table made of pallets to hide under or jump on and a perch in the run.

[abwsco]

Our covered WIR has got mushy this year as well even with the deep litter method of big woodshavings. Very disappointing but as DH pointed out we have had soooooooooo much rain and so often it has been torrential so it's found it's way into the WIR.

[Jules.]

My WIR stayed dry last year- this year its a mushy mess.

Its all the rain we have had.

[sleepymummy]

Thank you for all your help, everyone, I feel a bit better now! We do have covered sections and they have logs to perch on. We'll just have to persevere with the bedding I think so that it's not that squelchy and hope that it doesn't rain quite as much as it has done over the past month.

[TAJ]

Both my eglus have a perch that runs the width of the run at about half height - whilst they are on a patio so we do not have the mud issue they do prefer sitting up higher in wet windy weather (the run is covered with corrugated plastice sheeting).

 

Tracy