Chickens 'eating' the intended dust bath

[Peeplperson]

2 weeks ago, I put a galvanized tub in the run filled with 1/2 play sand, and 1/2 DE mixed together. I thought it would be a great dust bath and keep 'critters' off my girls. So far, no one has taken a bath in it, but they all seem to be eating the mixture (and of course, pooping in it). I mean the level has actually gone down, and I only have 7 chickens.

Any suggestions?

 

[saddina]

They needed grit.

How do you know they're not dusting there?

 

[consdrs]

Mine did the same thing! I put a huge box of sand, dirt, and DE for them to dust in. you would have thought I threw scratch into it the way they went at it! all their poo was this sandy dirty gritty stuff... yuck.... They had plenty of food and grit available and they still thought of it as a huge dinner box..

Connie

 

[For-The-Love-Of-Chickens]

We have one of those half wine barrels sunk into the ground in our chicken run and we fill it with sand as a dust bath. They do eat a lot of it, even though we also provide grit. Oh well. I figure they need to eat rocks, not me. Maybe play sand tastes better than pretty purple granite.

 

[Peeplperson]

Saddina,

I spend an embarrassing amount of time watching them - better than TV - and have never seen them so much as sit in the tub. Also, there should be some kind of indentation if they were nestling down in the sand, right?

 

[Judy]

WAY WAY too much DE. Half a cup in a typical washtub of sand would have been plenty. Needs to be used sparingly; not good for them to inhale it, any more than it is for us. I imagine they are avoiding it. I would set aside the contents except for a small amount, and remix and refill with sand, dry dirt, wood ashes, whatever.

 

[Peeplperson]

ddawn,

Thanks! I'll give that a try.