Use Chicken Coop Bedding for Fertilizer
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Raising chickens is one of the greatest joys of homesteading. Besides the bounty of delicious eggs, the birds provide endless entertainment with their quirky antics.
Like every animal, though, keeping chickens
can be wasteful if you do not know what you are doing. Luckily, there are easy
ways to reduce waste in your chicken coop.
When you are cleaning out your coop, keep that
dirty straw, scat and feathers for fertilizer. Many commercial fertilizers are
made using some byproduct of feather meal, so the material coming out of your
coop is not too different from what you would get in a store.
The combination of chicken bedding and manure
is handy in a number of different ways.
“I always have plenty of mulch,” said Lisa
Steele, blogger at Fresh Eggs
Daily and author of several books including“101 Chicken
Keeping Hacks.” “I mulch the garden in the fall with it. In the summer, I put
it on my strawberry beds, herb garden and vegetable garden. In the spring, I
put it in the compost pile.
If you are looking to save a little bedding
during the cold winter months — and save your frostbitten fingers and toes
from having to go outside as frequently, quite frankly — Nancy Wolff,
homesteader and blogger at Nancy on
the Home Front recommends a deep bedding technique.
“For our chickens we would do deep [litter] bedding in the winter
so we weren’t changing it every week,” Wolff said. “All the shavings when we
were cleaning out the coop went into the compost.”
By adding fresh shavings every so often
instead of cleaning out the coop, the bedding will not only form a fantastic
fertilizer, but the active microbial life in the bedding will help keep the
coop warm.
Believe or not, chickens do not need
supplemental heating, even in the winter.
“Your chicken coop doesn’t have to be heated,”
Wolff said. “Our chicken coop was insulated with a heat lamp, but we kept
chickens the first year in uninsulated barn and they were fine.”
Wolff said to check the combs for black tips,
which is a sign of frostbite, but for the most part, the birds are relatively
cold hardy. By letting your chickens enjoy the chill, you can reduce the amount
of excess energy used on your homestead.
The market for high-end backyard chicken coop
supplies is robust.
“You can spend $45 for big galvanized chicken
water trough,” Steele said. “That’s a lot of money for something that’s going
to rust in a couple years.”
Instead of spending hundreds of dollars on
troughs, check your local thrift store for supplies. Steele said to keep an eye
out for enamelware especially.
“Enamelware doesn’t crack in the winter. It
doesn’t rust like the metal does,” Steele said. “Enamelware is great for
feeders and waterers and troughs because it’s coated. Enamel roasting pans are
especially great because you can put cover on so rats can’t get into feed.”
One of the best parts about raising chickens
is the steady supply of fresh eggs in the mornings. Save those eggshells after
you crack them on the pan, though. Eggshells have many uses around your homestead,
including as a fertilizer and pest repellant for your plants.
One of the best uses for eggshells is as an
extra source of calcium for your chickens. Chickens needs calcium to make
shells for their eggs, and while commercial calcium supplements are usually
made from pulverized oyster shells, many chickens prefer their own eggshells
(don’t worry, it is unlikely to cause an unauthorized egg cannibalization).
Rinse the eggshells, crush them coarsely and add them to a dispenser or bowl in
your chicken coop.
“It really is a nice circle,” Steele said.
“Everything has a second use after you get them from your chickens.”
Every effort to homestead more sustainably —
even with your poultry — brings you one step closer to a self-sustaining,
closed-loop homestead.
Sam Schipani is a staff writer for Hello Homestead and the Bangor Daily News. She loves watching hummingbirds, eating flowers and shopping sustainably. She has previously written for Sierra, Smithsonian, Earth Island Journal, and American Farm Publications.
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Use Chicken Coop Bedding for Fertilizer
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