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Chicken and soil health
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Posted by briergardener 7 (My Page) on Mon, Feb 1, 10 at 12:25
I have a hen that is going free in out of season garden.
I had to cover of course beds with garlic, perennial onions and so on.
I am hearing sometimes that because my hen is digging everywhere, distroying mulch and eating earthworms, she does a lot of damage to the soil health.
Any opinions on this?
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Follow-Up Postings:
RE: Chicken and soil health
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| How big is your garden? How much total area does the chicken have to roam in (i.e. the whole yard)? I suppose there would be a lower limit to area that can support one, but one has to remember that earthworms and other critters will reproduce to fill the void left by departing ones, and the chicken is fertilizing as it goes. Keeping it all in balance is all you have to worry about. |
RE: Chicken and soil health
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| Don't worry about it. They don't dig very deep, their kicking around looking for bugs fluffs up the top debris. She leaves little deposits that are washed into the soil. Nature at her best. When you should worry is when you have a bunch of chickens in a yard where nothing can grow, and it stinks from having so much poop deposited in such a small area. Bad smell = bad management, for any living thing. Sue |
RE: Chicken and soil health
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| If chickens actually did destroy soil health then why is a garden planted in soil where a chicken coop once was grow so well? Poultry does not destroy soil health, they aid its development. |
RE: Chicken and soil health
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| I used to have free-roaming chickens too. They can destroy your garden. I used to fence them out of the veggie garden because of that. They would dig off the organic layer to make their dust baths, basically stripping off the organic layer to expose the soil to the sun. Not good when you're trying to keep your garden mulched. And they would pack down the soil too with their tromping around and thrashing in their dust baths. They liked the soil in the raised beds and concentrated there, even though they had multiple acres to wander in. You don't get an even distribution of chickens over all the available area. They stick together more or less, and have their favorite areas they spend most of their time in. You have just one hen? they are social creatures, and really need another chicken for company. Three is best if you have space. |
RE: Chicken and soil health
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I had three at first, two already died.
I am still thinking if i should get some chicks this spring. I hate to keep them locked in summer but prefer not to put chicken wire around every place where i don't want them to dig.
My Lady is lonely of course, she often comes to the french door and looks inside trying to get me out. The rest of day she spends messing with mulch on my veggies beds and digging everywhere. Sometimes i feel sorry for earthworms that she is undigging, i wish she hunts more for slugs :)
My backyard is around 7000 sq f, she should have plenty of room but she enjoys digging in veggie and berries beds of course. |
RE: Chicken and soil health
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| Kimmsr, overcrowding of animals and over-manuring soil doesn't really do the soil much good. I know there a lot of people in these forums who think dumping an endless amount of compost and manure on their soil is a great thing, but it isn't. And over-manuring also contaminates the water supply. There are places in the East that used to be livery stables, but haven't been for over 60 years, and they're still contaminating the water supply. |
RE: Chicken and soil health
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| Absolutely overcrowding is bad and that is why the Confined Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) are the worst thing that has come over the horizan. Animal diseases, water pollution, high levels of antibiotics in the foods produced that have unknown affects on the consumers are all problems with these places, but I doubt that anyone here would be an operator of a CAFO and small numbers of animals on the appropriate amount of land will be beneficial to that land as long as common sense is used to 1) protect that animals from harm, and 2) protect the garden from the animals. |
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