Chickens and rabbits (I must share my excitement)

Shayanna · #1 08/27/12, 09:30 AM

As I've mentioned before, we mix whole oats in with our rabbits food, and it tends to get spilled often, resulting in oat grass growing in the poo that falls under the hutches. Usually I pick some of the grass, rinse it off and feed it back to the rabbits, and they love it and its a little less wastefull, but you can't possibly pick ALL of it. And then every so often I would have to grab the mucking shovel and scoop it all and haul it over to the compost pile cause we can't put it in the garden immediately because then oat grass will kill our garden off. However, we have made an amazing discovery!
This friday we allowed our chickens to start free ranging, and they clean up under the hutches. They go under there, scratch all the poop around, spread the poo around the yard, eat ALL of the fallen oats and grass, and keep it clean and keep flies away from the hutches. I am so proud of my chickens I would probably hug them if I could. I love when the farm animals actually make our lives easier.

arnie · #2 08/27/12, 09:52 AM

Yes those chickens will scratch under the hutches eating all the goodys and bugs a word of caution .in my barn before I bilt a seprate pole shed the chickens began hanging out and roosting on top of tbe cages putting the rabbits in a messy situation :-) making a mess on the wire tops and more work for me :-( so far iv had no trouble in the new shed with the hanging cages the chickens still have free range but I'm watching out to discourage this before it starts

Shayanna · #3 08/27/12, 10:19 AM

I dont' really have to worry about that. The rabbit hutch is one of the homemade ones with a roof and walls and all the fancy stuff on it. And the chickens wings are all clipped so I don't think they'll be able to do too much damage. I was also worried about whether chickens walking underneath them would disturb the rabbits at all but they don't seem to mind. Not stressed in the slightest.

arnie · #4 08/27/12, 11:44 AM

I liked my old fachoned home made hutches also but I really like the the new set up as it is so easy to maintain .I will admit to having way to many chickens but I always sell out of eggs (and rabbits lately) .though iv got mostly heavy breed chickens a couple years ago I added a few brown leggorn hens and a rooster and his influence continues to show up in my home rasied birds .I have some americonas to that aer a little flighty .the line of meat rabbits I now have are very calm and friendly not getting spoked easly and meeting me at the wire .now I consider it an obligation to breed and cull my livestock for these friendly traits.:-) .I'm betting your rabbits will miss there oat grass treets i'v been in the middle of the second cuttingof hay season latly and toss the rabbits a hand full of this extra nice fresh hay and they finnish it off before any thing else.

Treewhisper · #5 09/03/12, 08:41 PM

I throw scratch under my cages as an extra incentive. Its so trained my chickens that they are waiting by my rabbitry in the mornings to feed. It works great in winter to still keep the rabbitry cleaned and odor free. If you have urine spots that are giving off an odor spead a cup of lime over it and the chickens will work it right in.