Dirt in Run?

[atravers]

Get a home delivery of construction sand and use it for the run. They love it and its easy to clean up with a kitty litter scooper.

 

[Sue d]

mine's all dirt too. (one section is sand to dust bathe, and the other is dirt/soil that seems a bit 'heavier' if that makes sense. they don't seem to mind. I add grass that I've pulled from other areas of my lawn and they'll just gobble that up. I find the dirt makes for super, easy clean up and I scoop multiple times, daily. they're all pretty content.

 

[coralbell7]

We used construction sand in our covered run also. I modified a metal rake with 1/4" hardware cloth and use that to rake/sift the poop out like a giant litter scooper. Works great in areas that are hard to get like under the coop!
The sand drains well, the girls dust bathe wherever they want, they use it as grit plus it's cool on their feet. Also, they have soft feet from the natural pedicure! Hahahaaaa!!!!
I rake the run out twice a month. It's only a 5x10 area.

 

[lab.adore]

we fill ours with mulch it works great by letting the rain in but keeping the dirt under it which keeps the chickens and the pen clean. we first layed down chicken wire to stop the girls from digging holes then layed down about a foot of mulch. it not only works great but the pen looks nice after words.
I used to spread hay but after a chicken got a sour croup and needed surgery I stopped that.
as for grass clippings and digging I gave them a kiddie pool with dirt and grass clippings and we dump earth worms in it.

 

[Surferjo]

I went with sand and I'm very happy I did.
It drains and drys super fast. Once a month I screen it and it look almost brand new. Every now and again I sprinkle some PDZ horse stall powder.

As you can see my coop is covered. I don't know how well it would work uncovered. Rain would eventually make hard pan out of it.

 

[scobb]

I have sand in my run and it works very well. I do poop scoop it each day but this is my choice. I also have sand in the coop and nest boxes. I put pine shavings over the sand in the nest boxes. I also have a poop board in my coop under the roosts. I line the poop board with clean newspaper each morning and put the poopy papers into my compost tumblers. This works well because chicken manure should be composted with 50% brown / 50% green. The poop is the green, the newspaper if the brown. I do also add coffee grounds, egg shells and mulched leaves to the compost tumblers. Bottom line, I am a fan of sand.

 

[0wen]

Wood chip based DLM here. Basically the same mix for coop & run - the coop mix gets added to the run if/when it needs to finish composting. Add in dried pine needles, dried leaves, garden waste, weeds, grass clippings, kitchen scraps and it stays there til I need it. I 'Back to Eden' garden and the coop is a step in that process. No smell, no abundance of flies, virtually no maintenance - I drag a rake over it briefly when I take food out; otherwise I just toss out scratch or snacks and let the birds to the work...

 

[woods79]

our run is dirt every week or 2 I put fresh grass clipping in and the girls love it, after a few days I rake things out so there is not and wet musty grass in there, this will be our first Maine winter though and thinking of putting a good layer of straw down after the ground freezes and replenishing it through out the winter.

 

[Trish1974]

The only way to keep grass in a run is to build some grazing panels. Make a square or rectangle out of wood and screw hardware cloth on one side. Lay this down over grass or sow some seed under it. The chickens will eat the grass as it grows up through the wire, but they can't dig up the roots.

I put leaves, pine straw and garden waste in my runs. This keeps it from getting muddy, stinky & slimy. They love to dig through it looking for worms/bugs. This digging will shred the leaves and along with their poo, will make great compost for a garden.

Henless, that is GENIUS!

 

[Lissa Bitton]

I use natural sand in my coop and run. Just scoop it with a kitty litter scoop. Easy, works great and provides grit slso. My chickens ate mostly free range and only have eight in there. I haven't had to completely out my sand and it has been in there 2 ro 3 years.