Feeding Chickens and Ducks in winter on their own compost pile created in the coop, Zero watse
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Feeding Chickens and Ducks in winter on their own compost pile created in the coop cutting feed costs in the great white snow covered north.
In this video I show how we use compost created in the chickens coop in order to reduce waste, build great soil, feed the chickens and dicks and cut our feed costs during the winter. Although we do have pelleted grain available to the chickens and ducks year around they consume it far less in the winter since we started using waste and spoiled organic materials in their coop from fall into the spring In the spring, summer, and fall they eat very little grain and are outside foraging on small heavily mulched areas of the food forest. Today in this video I show how I rebuild the compostable materials below their roosting perch. The chickens are our little entropy machines scratching and pecking at the pile and eventually making a nearly flat and level of the material. The pile needs to be reconstructed several times throughout the winter.
This coop never gets down to the freezing temperature despite being 20 degrees below zero Fahrenheit at times. In our area we also have very deep snow and high winds and the chickens and ducks do not go outside in the very cold and blowing times.
In the fall we start the base level with a good 10-12 inches of leaves that are collected from a neighboring city. I also gather all the vegetable and garden waste and start building a pile beneath the perch. Their waste is also deposited on the pile overnight. I also produce much more greens than we could possibly consume and that all gets feed to them and what they don’t eat goes onto the pile. Throughout the winter we add hay and more leaves to the pile which helps to keep the pile from going anaerobic and making an ammonium smell. I will also occasionally incorporate vermicompost complete with eggs and worms to the base of the pile when it is rebuilt.
You may be able to detect the large white stringy looking stuff (mycelium) from the decomposing fungi on the base of the fork full of material as I turn the material and throw it up onto the pile.
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