# Forest floor



## GratefulGirl (Sep 10, 2012)

My 13 week olds have now been outside in their new home for one week! Yay! I would like to now start focusing on building some healthy soils in their large 30 x 50 run. We have mostly sand on our property and not much in the way of bugs live there - ants, ant eaters, spiders & roaches is about all I have seen but I'm sure there are mites and other stuff too I'd like to control with the living forest floor. I have read that cedar is not good for chickens but that is the majority of what we have in the way of trees. There are a few hardwoods and one pine tree. So has anyone had a bad experience with cedar in the run? Can I include cedar limbs and "leaves"? I will ask my family and friends to save their leaves and grass clippings for me as well. I am assuming I should avoid any grass clippings or leaves which have been treated with chemicals.

I will also be layering in the pine shavings from their coop as Bee recommended. I think I'll have to change it out every couple weeks because I can't do a true deep litter since the house is elevated and there is not enough room for it in the bottom - only about an inch or two for build up.

I also want to put some wood ash in their run for dust bathing. Can it be any type of ash or is cedar ash a no-no?

Thanks in advance for sharing your experiences with me. I am so intrigued with the development of a living forest floor for the chickens!


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## Bee (Jun 20, 2013)

The cedar ash and small trimmings should be fine..it's the cedar shavings that seem to have the heavy oils that can cause respiratory distress in some birds. If the trimmings cause such a thing, just remove them.

Any woody weeds you can place in there will help as well as if you can place an old stump or two as the bugs will gravitate to the layer under the bark and the chickens like standing on them at times. Every so often you can move them to a new location and let the birds eat what bugs have been hiding under the stumps or logs. 

I sometimes have a lot of cedar shavings in my nest boxes and sometimes in my coop bedding, so if you have really good ventilation in your coop the cedar might not pose a problem for you. When it's fresh will be when it's the worst but if you let it age for awhile after it's cut, it should be just fine to then place it in the bedding materials.


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## GratefulGirl (Sep 10, 2012)

Thanks Bee glad to know all that gives me alot more options! I will post photos periodically.


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## Bee (Jun 20, 2013)

Here's a quote from an interesting and extremely informative post from over on BYC that may help you determine whether to use the kind of cedar you have:



> Consider the various potential kinds of cedar are as sparse as a forest when you see all the different trees. Let's go over the two different types most popular in the US and their potential side effects that can affect people, pets, and animals of all types:
> 
> Western Red Cedar (Thuja plicata) - side effects include: mild irritant, sensitizer, asthma, nervous system effects, Nasopharyngeal carcinoma (rare)
> 
> ...


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## GratefulGirl (Sep 10, 2012)

Wow Bee that's very helpful info. Since I am in Texas I am probably in the clear! Yay!


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## GratefulGirl (Sep 10, 2012)

Here are a few pics to show what I started with & progress so far. Fall leaves will bring alot more to work with.


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## chicken_coop99 (Jun 19, 2013)

I have used cedar chips ever since i have had chickens i haven't had a problem i think they keep the smell down and smell really good


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## Bee (Jun 20, 2013)

Wow! That's looking really good! I think you will start to see a big difference after awhile in your soils. A lady over on BYC had sandy soils too and she had even placed more sand there in an effort to control smells and moisture but it didn't really work.

She switched to a deep litter in her coop a couple of months back and she says her soil under it is now dark and loamy looking, with good moisture control and she can't even find any feces. No smells, no flies and her chickens always have something to do and something to hunt. She and I both have stumps in our deep litter so that the birds can get up on them...they really seem to like to do that.

I call stumps and other things placed in coops and runs as different places of "being" that they often find out in the woods and pasture. Here's a pic of her birds in the run....




























She just added some grass frames to this run the other day and will be planting them so that the birds have some winter forage too....she is really creating some habitat in that place and she also free ranges at times.


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## GratefulGirl (Sep 10, 2012)

Those sure are some beautiful birds & such a nice run! I have several trees to take out as soon as the sap stops running & so I plan to put stumps in then if not sooner. Question for you - I put some alfalfa in the small secured pen attached to the hen house. It has rained every day for the past few days so it's very wet now. Should I rake this out or just let it dry out & keep building forest floor on top? It smells sorta musty not bad but thought I should ask since we haven't discussed hay specifically.


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## Bee (Jun 20, 2013)

Alfalfa and hay will hold a lot of mold and I don't recommend using either as a large component of deep litter in climates that are humid, though they might work well in an arid climate for holding moisture. 

If you can rake it out where it will dry sufficiently before you apply things over it, it may just be alright. You are going to see some level of molds in deep litter anyway, but it will be much like leaf mold and with the chickens constantly tossing the contents, this doesn't get a chance to really establish well. 

Try it and tell us how it went?


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