Peacocks

[Oat]

Hi All

Just about to put up a walk in run and couple the up to it. (It is a not the Omlet walk in run as this is super expensive for the size of it)

It will give the hens a minimum of 9 square metres and will house 5 hens.

 

Question to those of you that have walk in runs... Do you need to move the walk in runs around the garden, or how to clean them out etc? The floor of the run will be soil + whatever else i need to put in like chippings, shavings etc.

 

I do feel guilty about the lack of pasture the chooks will have available to them, but happy that they will have more room then the 3m run on the

 

Thanks

Oat

[Egluntyne]

Mine stays put. They have Aubiose to kick about in and I give it a major clear out around every 6 weeks.

[Ain't Nobody Here]

My WIR is on soil too and I use Easibed. Every few months I rake some of it out, throw some powdered disinfectant down and some new bedding. It's attached to my garage so I couldn't move mine even if I wanted to .

[Olly]

Same here, I couldn't move it because of where it is/the size. About once a year, I have a major dig-out of the earth floor, and use it to fill raised beds/mulch the borders, or whatever. The rest of the year, they get wood chip, sawdust and aubiose depending on what's to hand, and I rake it out every 6-8 weeks and put it in the composter. I usually fork in a bit of garden lime at this point, too.

 

I let mine out to free range as often as I can (4-5 times a week, for an hour or more) and I give them greens - cabbage leaves, bolted brassicas, and so on on the days that they can't get out.

[Oat]

Thanks folks!

 

We wanted to go with a good size run like this as the hens will stay in the majority of the time due to previous issues with a neighbours dog, also so that they don't eat the veggie patch!

Will go with wood chippings / shavings etc for the floor base and will post pics of it when it's up and finished. Will be a good 3 or 4 weeks until it's finished as have a little lanscaping and demolition to do