How to build a self-cleaning chicken coop / farm.

Basically its simple. One man's garbage is another mas gold. We backward engineer it. We don't find a solution in a direct way. We put a question instead. What eats poop? And we find it. Let say we stick with a 2 options for now. One would be red soldier fly ... the another would be red wiggler.

In case of black soldier fly we have a problem. Basically we need to collect the poop and give it to the flies. That's work and we are lazier than this. We want to keep them in the same place. The black soldier larva needs almost 30C to grow and except Africa or Mexico we don't have that heat. It would be a chaos in many ways. Lets stick with the red wiggler.

Red wiggler is like the classical well known earth worm. The difference is: that eats anything before it starts to purify. Basically this worms crawl out from the earth at night time and eat up stuff before it starts to rotten. They stay at the upper part of the earth. They clean up the mess .... the bacteria and viruses in a way. If some chicken poop falls down they crawl out and eat it almost "immediately". They don't need nearly 30C than black soldier fly larva !!! They are not hatching and start to fly. Reproduction is easy and needs no expensive lamps and knowledge. They just do what they have to do.

We assume that we keep free range chicken so we have like 8 clusters of garden. That we rotate daily. Every day we let them out in another cluster. This way bugs and grass can recover easily. So cleaning is mostly addressed under the huge chicken coop.

The chicken coop is like 3.5m height. And flat at the top.(flat roof) At 2.5-3m we position their sleeping place and below we put a metal mesh Half an inch openings. Like 1.5*1.5cm So they can't fall down. But the poop and the feathers can !!!

What happens actually? Out in the field the poop has 8 days to washed away by rain and water. The poop in this time will make the land more fertile. The grass will grow even faster. More water will be in the soil. There will be more bugs to eat and find. 

In the inside: the poop ...feathers falls down (threw the 1*1cm metal mesh) and the poop and feathers (in time) is eaten up by the worms. That poop will be transformed in "sterile earth". Like that's what worms do.

The 2.5m between the metal mesh and earth is a good idea. This way every few years you can collect all of the first quality earth produced by the worms with a small tomcat. The first quality earth can be sold for a fortune. Or you can use it for flower beds, vegetables, greenhouse etc.

The poop when it starts rotting is worm. It worms up the surface of the earth. In winter time the worms wont hide in the deep. They will be able to stay at the surface and eat. Throwing half rotted straw or hay bales here is a good idea. Grass...leaf's or any other organic farm waste is welcomed here. Like red wigglers and earth worms worms will eat it up. 

It Poop contains lots of nitrogen + carbon from the grass leaf's etc will get an almost perfect Carbon Nitrogen ratio. Meso bacteria will worm it up like a compost. Because the chicken as=re spread above they slowly but surely cover with poop the organic matter below. The poop will be spread evenly so it wont over-worm 2 much to overheat the worms. Like in huge compost piles that will burn the worms.

This way the meso bacteria + red wigglers + worms and other creatures will decompose poop almost on an instant.

The extra worms could be given to fish or frogs. This way the illnesses wont have a chance to spread. You dont feed them back to chicken.

Winter time.

The only problem here is like frost. Winter time you need to have some walls so heat of the chicken manure and composting stays within. Forget to mention you water the earth in this area so a small but sure composting will occur. Bacteria and worms need water.

If we play with zero energy part of it we might use a walipini

I would go with this design that I used with the underground lake. Here instead with plants we have chicken and the metal half inch net under them.

An almost flat ... nylon poly rooftop would make the earth worm plus meso (compost bacteria) work even in the winter. The daytime sun would heat up the floor for worms and bacteria like a huge greenhouse.

And the earth itself would store the heat like a battery for night time.

The warm is not for the chicken. They don't need it. But worms and composting bacteria does. Chicken by nature are built to withstand cold quite well. For god sake they have feathers. They lough North Face jackets in the face :))

However I have a feeling that with that much light and worm and openness they would lay more eggs. Even in winter time. The earth below would act like a thermal battery.

Would store the heat daytime and in the evening it would release it back slowly. And all of the heat would accumulate at the upper part. Where the chickens are. They would feel in Hawaii even in harsh Norway climate. That would mean more eggs in winter. (Not sure about this.)

Melting the snow or not on the almost flat rooftop is another article. My personal opinion is you shouldn't. Its way cheaper to build this way and snow insulates for free. For a few days a year you can use some low consuming led lamps to help out the chicken. I live in Hungary for example. We don't have snow for more than a few day in a years.

USA in general is way warmer than Europe. So that's not a concern.

 In the summer you can cover the flat roof with a semitransparent material so chicken will be shaded. You open most of the walls side walls so wind blows out the heat. You\ll get fresh air almost on an instant. The free range chicken can go back for shelter in the summer heat here. No ventilation or air conditioning needed at all.

Chicken can't go in red wiggler area just above it with like 2.5m. Else they will eat them. Chicken don't sleep on the half inch 1.5cm metal fence directly. You put 15cm*5cm wood on the mesh..

This way when they sit down night time the wood insulates their foot. They feel secure about like rats not being able to bite their foot. Especially at 2.5m height ...rats can't jump that far. 1.5m at most.

Many mess it up here. Chicken are not flying birds. They naturally they are ground birds so they hide in bushes on the floor ... not on branches or trees. They do that because they don't have better options. And for us humans it's easier to clean after them. So we forced them to do so.

The 15cm*5cm wood is a great idea right on the metal mesh.. We need to put them within the same level.!!! They know intuitively the lower chicken will be eaten by predators so they fight for the upper places. Making them at the same level we avoid this fighting hierarchy problem.

Cold usually won't kill chicken ... -30C is like nothing to them. If humid wind is not blowing o their feathers cold itself is like nothing to them. The problem is their foot. That can't take it. Positioning themselves on the 15cm wide and 5cm height wood : sitting on it with their belly and ass will prevent damaged feet even in the coldest winter.

For further questions contact me. Let me know.

p.s.

Not that's sustainable, zero energy and easy to build and maintain ...its way-way cheaper to build and sustain than any other industrial chicken coop. Come on guys no more excuses not doing it this way. Leave your comment here. Subscribe for new articles.