My experience with wood pellets

SubArcticFowl

Songster
Sep 14, 2019
83
293
146
NWT, Canada
I thought I'd share my experience after using wood pellets in two ways over the last two winters. For five months of the year my chickens stay in their indoor coop, an 8' x 16' area under my deck with a concrete floor. It is insulated with two warm walls that keeps the temp around -5 C for most of the winter. On cold days, -40 to -45 C it is around -8 C and on warm days, -25 C or so it might pop up over freezing. I heat my house with wood pellets and get them delivered in bulk. So I figured I'd try them as bedding material.

The first winter I used the pellets straight, dry and compressed. I scooped up poop almost daily and it worked fine, unless I didn't scoop and then it smelled. Basically everything stayed frozen and dry. There was an average amount of dust. The biggest problem was if I was out of town and asking people to scoop poop was a challenge.

The second winter I tried to get a deep litter system going. I watered the pellets to get them to fluff up and turn back into saw dust. It was about 12" to 18" deep. I watered it when it started to dry out and turned it when I was able, but it never really warmed up. In late winter a strong smell which I think is ammonia started to build up. The chickens moved to their summer home two weeks ago and the smell is still there. I've been trying to pile it up to get a hot compost system going, but it is just not happening. It's funny, because normally ammonia smell means too many greens and not enough browns, but I should have lots of carbon with my wood mass.

Going forward I might just stick with the dry method or do something else. I also need to figure out what to do with the existing bedding that is not composting.

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