Every fall I rake up the dried leaves and throw some in the runs for the chickens/guineas. They dig through them happily, finding bugs and tiny bits of grasses to eat. Sadly I can only get dry leaves once a year, but since they are absolutely free I never waste a chance to use them when I can.
This year I decided to use them as bedding in the largest chicken coop I have. Technically it's the guinea coop, same idea though.
This October I did my traditional fall clean out when I get rid of all the bedding from the last year. I use the deep litter method and it's been working great in this coop. The deep litter method requires quite a bit of bedding to start with, so all I did was fill the coop with dry leaves. I
raked some up into bags to add in once the chickens broke up the leaves a bit.
That's it!
So far so good. I really like using leaves in the coop as well as the run. It's cheaper, easy & the chickens seem to love it. Read on for all the details....
I really hope getting your chicken coop prepped for winter isn't an issue for you! If it isn't....that means you live somewhere warm. That sounds so nice. Here in western Pennsylvania it snows a good deal. I also get what they call "lake effect snow" because of the moisture in the air over lake Erie. Even my friends down in Pittsburgh have it easier then I do, so getting the whole chicken farm prepped for winter is essential!
Today we have about 3" of frozen snow (when it rains on top of snow, then freezes and snows again. Yeah, that mess!) and it's only 11 degrees this morning! Yuck! The chickens hate it, I hate it...and now I'm playing catch-up and getting the coops winterized and the chickens ready for the cold. So come along and join us while we chip ice, insulate, re-group and get ready for winter!
Chicken Keeping in Winter
We've had 6 different pets since we got our first chickens. 3 dogs and 3 cats. Each animal has a different personality and therefore a different way of reacting to chicks or chickens. Take Anastasia Bug for example. (she's the calico in the picture) Bug will sniff a chick if it's near her, but mostly she just ignores it. I have numerous pictures of her with chicks and ducklings. Sometimes they even snuggle up to her for a nap. She couldn't care less!
We had a Siamese mix named Maggie that was curious about the chicks, but would never do more then pat them a little with a soft paw. Then there's the cat we got after Maggie died. Trixie. She's a Bengal. High prey drive. We have to keep her completely away from the chicks or they would be no more! She has even figured out how to open the sliding glass door to get outside and chase full grown guineas! Bad Trixie!
So as you can see, each animal has a different reaction to the chicks/chickens. Cat's however, aren't as easily trained as dogs.
Can dogs and chickens get along?
Today we need to talk about chickens and bugs....and me being an idiot. lol Once again I let bugs crawl on me just to get you a picture. Yuck! First it was mites in the coop bedding, then an Instagram tick video.....this time it was weevils. Ewwww! Let me start at the beginning....
Every morning I throw a treat to the chickens of each coop as I let them out for the day. It was getting cold so I grabbed a handful of scratch before going outside to let the Millies out. Normally I head straight to the coop to open the door, but this morning I stopped to fill a water bucket. As I'm kneeling there with the hose in one hand and scratch in the other I start to feel something tickling my fingers. A crawling feeling. I look down and ewwww bugs! Of course I threw the scratch immediately.
Then I decided I needed a picture, so I grabbed the phone and more chicken scratch and waited for it to start crawling again. Yuck! Now the weird parts: nothing appeared to be crawling when I looked into the container of scratch and it was a closed watertight plastic jar. So how did the bugs get in there, and why did I not notice them before? (I filled this container back in winter) Read on for answers...
I've seen all types of different things people teach their chickens to do. Some are really clever, others are downright silly. I have one hen that jumps straight up into the air to grab a piece of bread from our hands. I also have a little roo that comes running whenever I yell the word "cookie" then snatches the cookie from my hand and runs away to eat it! (He only likes chocolate chip. No Oreos!)
I've seen lots of videos of funny chicken tricks so my question this week is....do your chickens do any tricks?
