Part 0800.0005

[markymarque]

Hi I’m Mark from Leicester and I’m new. We are going to get some chickens to add to pet collection, 3 cats, 2 guinea pigs, koi pond & fish tank. We have brought a coop with is 1.9m long, including run and nesting box. I have done some research. I will have many questions so please bear with me.

My first question is what to stand the coop on. Currently the space where it’s going is against a fence on the boarder which currently is half soil and half gravel stones, (underneath the stone is soil). I don’t want to put the wooden coop directly onto the soil for two reasons, the wood will rot quicker and the mouse & rats will burrow underneath (we have a railway and fields at the bottom of the garden and we do have mice & rats). I could put slabs down or what I’m more thinking of is laying a border of bricks on the soil for the coop to stand on, this way the mice and rats might not get in and the chickens can have the soil.

 

What do you think

 

Thanks

Mark

[Egluntyne]

I'd recommend that you put it on paving slabs. They are easy to hose down and nothing can burrow into the run from beneath.

 

Welcome to the forum.

[madchickenlady]

I second the slabs. Much easier to keep the area sweet and nothing can get in Use a nice layer of equestrian bedding on top for the hens to scratch about in If you do leave the run on soil, it will need regular digging over/replacing. Chicken poo + water + heat =

[mollyripkim]

Welcome, I'm fairly new too and have learned lots on here. Mine are on brick paving for the winter in a covered run with thick layer of horse bedding. It's really easy to change every 6 weeks and I poo pick every day.

[Ain't Nobody Here]

Welcome to the forum . Just to give a different perspective, I have my walk in run on slabs round the edges and soil in the middle. I cover the whole floor with a deep layer of Hemcore or Easibed which I remove then replace every couple of months. Works well for me (although I don't have a rat/mouse problem).

[markymarque]

Thanks for the replies, i think slabs are going to be best, next question is bedding, we use wood chippings and straw for the guinea pigs, which are all brought from pet supplies not farms, can i use the same stuff for the hens?

[chick wiggle]

Hi Markymarque and welcome to the forum. Id go with paving slabs not only to prevent mice and rats but its also more secure from foxes tunneling in too and easier to clean

I use easibed bedding in my run, its a horse bedding and is very absorbant and works well as long as the run has a roof.

good luck and let us know how you get on

[Snowy]

Hi and welcome Mark

My run also has slabs around the edge and soil in the middle. If you use the pet bedding it will be quite expensive. I buy bales of horse bedding (aubiose) from Welland Valley Feeds in Market Harborough. You could then use that for the guineas as well. But I also scrounge any wood chippings when I see the tree surgeons about - they are happy to dump them on my front garden! And dry leaves in autumn is another good run floor. The hens really do love a bit of soil underneath - they dig great big craters for themselves to dustbathe in!

[doctors girls]

i am also new to chickens and planning a wir in april a 6x9x6 wir i plan to to put a third of it on slabs and the other part on woodchip with a a gravel base for drainage the wir will be raised off the ground but i also intending to put some half inch chicken wire underneath to stop mice and rats from getting in will this be ok as chickens do like to forage i dont want them to catch their toes on it there will be a good 4 to 5 inch in depth base layer would that be ok for the chucks

john

[Clairey_Fairy]

I've had my girls 4 months now. It's a bit of trial and error really. We have a and run, and 2 chickens. It lasted 2 weeks on the grass before it was a muddy mess. The garden is too small to move it around all the time, so we did some logroll edging and put the whole lot on woodchip (fairly deep so I could still slide the tray out over the top of the edging). Next modification came in the form of putting and edging of bricks around under the edge of the run as the chickens were digging under the eglu and foxproof run edging and causing subsidance! This worked really well, the girls were free to dig in the woodchip and the bricks kept it all nice and neat! They love digging and finding worms and stuff. And I raked over the woodchip and sprinkled Stalosan F periodically. It was all getting a bit mucky though (although not smelly at all) so this weekend we lifted off the eglu and dug out the old woodchip from the middle (stuff round the outside still fine), sprinkled some Stalosan on the soil, and have now put a layer of Easibed in, not quite so deep (as they just dig and kick it all out), but this should be easy to replace when it's mucky. It's nice to have some soil underneath so they can dig for worms etc.

 

Here are a few photos of our coop and run. Hope it helps.

 

[markymarque]

Thats this all interesting stuff, I've been out with my tape measure today and the coop fits well over 3 slabs, I've seen on the web that people put large cat litter trays / shallow storage boxes in the coop with soil in.