Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Poultry and Pets => The Hen House => Topic started by: VikkiSpells on October 08, 2013, 14:13
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Hiya. Im going to inherit 3 chickens on Monday. I have fenced off half my garden so my dear dogs cannot get to them but the half that is fenced off is concrete. I want to put something on top of this so the hens are a bit more comfortable and able to scratch around. Im new to chicken keeping so unsure as what is ok, my first though was just ordinary bark chippings but I've read this is not so good. anyone with any suggestions?
Also how would I go about making them a dust bath is a large plastic/wooden bowl filled with dust enough?
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I use miscanthus for the chickens to scratch around in. It is cheap to buy and lasts a long time too. For a dust bath mine have a large shallow tub trug that we fill with play sand, old compost, sweepings from the patio, diatom.... the chickens are very happy with it.
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Not advisable to use sawdust this is bad for their respiratory tracts. :)
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soil is fine to use as a dust bath - afterall this is what mine get when they make their own dust bath in the middle of my garden (just right for me to fall in and hurt my ankle :mad:) :)
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Our girls run in on concrete slabs and it has worked very well for us - it has a three inch layer of hardwood chippings which aren't cheap but are lasting really well - they scratch about in the chippings to find grit that I've scattered about and the odd dried worm which I've placed for them. They have two dust baths one is an old tin and the other is a wooden box both of which I fill with soil and diatom - they love them both!!! and it's great to watch them something I've been doing a lot of since we had them 2 months ago!!! Good luck with your girls.