Chickens are one of nature’s best recycling systems. It’s one of their favorite things to do in fact. These little opportunistic omnivores love turning everything they possibly can fit into their beaks into delicious eggs for you and your family to have for breakfast.
Chances are that if you’ve owned or worked with chickens, you’ve seen how they spend their free time (which is literally all of it). Scratching and pecking around in the dirt, grass, and undergrowth to find something tasty to eat. Chickens are organic composting machines! So, why not put their natural tendencies to good use and actually put those birds to work? Someone’s gotta pay the bills after all!
Recently at Guiding Star Farm, we decided to build a new composting system. Instead of putting it behind our barn, where it had been in the past, and had unfortunately not gotten as much attention as we’d have liked, we put it right into our chicken yard. It wasn’t a hard decision either. The pros of composting with chickens are plentiful and the cons are seemingly non-existent.
- The compost pile will attract critters which means the chickens get access to worms, insects, and other various food scraps increasing their protein intake and calories which equates to higher egg quality.
- By scratching and spreading the composting material, chickens are adding oxygen to the microbes that actually break down and cause the material to decompose.
- Chickens poop everywhere. Chicken litter is full of nitrogen, but high in ammonia. Composting “cools” the manure and litter material which means that your organic composted soil will no longer burn your plants.
- You will no longer need to sort your scraps for the compost. Normally when composting, cooked food, meat or bones can’t be recycled. But with chickens, however, the birds will take care of it all for you and you can just pick out the bones when you’re spreading the compost into your garden beds.
- As your compost pile biodegrades, it will generate a noticeable amount of heat which will keep your birds warm and comfortable during those colder Autumn and Winter months.
- It’s a great way to entertain your birds. Well cared for and busy chickens are healthy chickens. Healthy chickens are happy chickens. Happy chickens lay the best eggs. Keeping your chickens entertained is a win-win.
Here on the farm, we opted for a two bay compost system made out of recycled wood pallets. Pallets were the perfect choice for compost bays because their slatted sides allowed for ample airflow and leaving them exposed to the elements such as wind and rain can only help your compost pile decompose quicker.
Additionally, having multiple bays is essential for the facile rotation of your compost. In our case, we will use one side for the loading of food waste and other organic material and the other side for turning over the compost pile and transferring over the decomposed material to later use for our garden beds.
Chickens and composting go together like peanut butter and jelly. So, save your scraps, keep your chickens happy, and enjoy your delectable golden breakfast treasures!
***As a side note, some things such as apple seeds, avocado, coffee grounds, foxglove, and hollyhocks can be toxic to chickens, so it’s best to leave these out of the compost entirely for the safety of your livestock.***