Poop board experts!

[theoldchick]

The hubby and I are planning our hen ranch and when I mentioned having a poop board for easy cleaning he gave me a blank stare. I have him a blank stare right back because I really don't know much about them either! So any and all information about poop boards: making them, maintaining them, and so forth would be greatly appreciated!

 

[nivtup]

Just a board that goes under the roost to catch most of it.

It depends on your roosts.

Get them going and you will find the concentration area. cut and place a board to catch it. Cleaning is dumping / scraping it off.


Good luck.

 

[elmo]

Some people use boards that are fixed (attached) and scrape the droppings off into a bucket for removal. I use plastic boot trays held on shelf supports under the roosts. The plastic tray is light and easy to remove, take over to my composter and dump out. Most of the droppings don't stick to the plastic and just roll right off. I use an old garden trowel to scrape off the cecal poops. Then I hose off the trays and replace them under the roosts.

In freezing weather (which we don't usually get here, but right now we are), I can't hose off the trays because all our outdoor faucets are shut off and insulation wrapped. So instead I simply sprinkle a little sand from the coop floor onto the trays.

The basic idea of a poop board is to make it easy to remove the droppings that accumulate from nighttime roosting in one place. You'll find that this amounts to about half, maybe a bit more, of a hen's daily production of poo. When my husband took over the chicken chores while my daughter and I were at Disneyworld, it kinda surprised him how much poo our nine tiny bantams produced every night. To me, though, it doesn't seem nearly as much as our small dog deposits every day...somehow right in my path to the chicken coop so I have to shovel it up and move it or risk stepping in it.

 

[fiberart57]

I don't use poop boards.

I have a rather short house for my six hens; it's 4'6" at the tallest point and tapers down. They're bedded with wood shavings and I go out and just pick the poop off the top of the shavings. It works better for the compost heap. Since it's been so cold, the poop is frozen solid by the time I get there and any pile they may have left on the roost is harder to get off than on top of the shavings.

I only have to add a few more shavings once every two weeks or so to bring the level up to the correct height. (It's deeper now in the cold weather.)

But my hen house is also raised up on legs and I access the inside by doors and don't ever have to actually go in the house. I could see needing poop boards if I had to walk inside it much.

Mary

 

[kateseidel]

I have multiple roosts in my coop (14 hens - 8x12 coop), and poop boards. On the primary roost, I started with a sheet of glasboard, which I scraped daily. Recently I added a lip to it, and I now keep about an inch of Sweet PDZ (Stall Dry) which I scoop daily. This area catches about 90% of all droppings, and the Sweet PDZ insures my coop does not smell. The secondary roost has a linoleum covered removable board, but they don't roost there much.

The primary roost and poop board

The secondary roost(s)

 

[teach1rusl]

Well, you've been given tons of info. You do want them to be wide enough to make sure that the poop that drops will land there, rather than on the floor. And you want them to be far enough below the roosts so that you'll have no problem scraping them. I scrape mine daily, while some scrape every few days. I just hold my droppings bucket at the edge of the board and use a 6 inch putty knife to scrape the poop into it...takes a minute. Here's how mine is situated. There are tons of variations.

 

[pattgal]

Any idea how you would set up a poop board when the roost run across from each other? Like one lower one lengthwise and the other width wise and higher up

 

[elmo]

Quote:
So an "L" shape, right? I would go ahead and put the droppings boards for both roosts at the same level. I have my roosts like this is both of my coops but I have both roosts at the same level to avoid squabbling in my flock over who gets the higher roost spots.

 

[ARose4Heaven]

hooks on the wall behind the roost. Hang a shower curtain on the hooks, spread out under the roost. Just unhook, roll up, take outside and shake. Easy!

Keeps the poo off the wall behind too.

 

[bills]

My dropping board runs under the entire length of my hens roost. I added a small lip of wood all around the edges, to help contain a thin layer of wood shavings that I spread on it. The shavings make for easy clean up, and prevent the board from getting too messy. The top of the board has Formica on it, so it is easy to clean, and won't soak up any moisture. The Formica can be easily scrapped and washed as well.
It has worked great for keeping the floor litter cleaner, longer, and as I clean it daily the coop is generally less moist, and smells far better.

You can use scrap wood, for a dropping board so you don't need to spend a lot to build one. You could use linoleum, or even a good exterior oil paint, rather than Formica on it.