Chicken Poop

I spend a disproportionate amount of time thinking about what comes out of the business end of a chicken, as I am sure you do.  What’s that?  It’s just me?  Anyways, chicken poop is garden gold.  Keep in mind, though, that you can’t put it directly onto your crops and gardens when it is fresh.   It will burn your plants because of its high nitrogen content.  You either need to let it “cure” for thirty days or add it to your compost bin.  I add the manure and pine shavings used to line my coop right into my composter.  This satisfies the necessary brown requirement needed to make my compost bin work.

All of the above is great, but if just starting out or building your own coop, you really need to think about how you are going to “mine” all of the garden gold about to come your way.   Let me share some tips as this was a part of the coop design I spent the most time on. 

The one thing to bear in mind is that a coop which is easy to clean will get cleaned more often.  So whatever route you go, you need to make things easy on yourself.  I ended up putting a side door into my coop just for cleanup.  Whether you go with only a main door or decide on a second access point, don’t forget to measure your broom.  Your door should be large enough to accommodate your chosen poop tool. 

Poop access point, aka the "mine" shaft

One other key feature was my decision to make my roosting bars removable.  I mounted 2x4s to the walls of my coop using raised brackets.  This allows me to pull them out and I end up with a large 4x6 foot platform I am able to sweep right out into a bucket which is then dumped into the composter.

Behind the curtain.  Note how the boards are set into the brackets for easy removal.

Just a few things I have found useful as I mine for garden gold.

Andy