Due to irregular maintenance, the dust and dirt in your chicken coop kick different diseases among your flock. The dirty coop leads to many other problems, but you can control these issues with care and maintenance.
Following the particular monthly, quarterly, and annual chicken coop maintenance checklist is crucial to keeping your flock safe and healthy. Regularly maintaining your coop prevents rodent, parasite infestations, and predator attacks.
Daily maintenance includes refreshing the water, cleaning the bowls and containers, collecting eggs, etc. The monthly take-care tasks contain managing your coop’s bedding and sanitizing the Waterer.
Quarterly maintenance tasks include deep cleaning your coop, preparing for winter, and arranging clean and dry bedding. And finally, the annual maintenance task is all about thoroughly cleaning and completely repairing your coop.
Today’s article will explain the ultimate chicken coop maintenance checklist monthly, quarterly, and annually. So, here check out what guide we arranged for you. Let’s start the discussion:
Chicken Coop Maintenance Checklist – Daily, Monthly, Quarterly & Annual Tasks
Your chicken stays happy and healthy and lays more eggs in a clean coop. As a chicken coop owner, you must ensure a clean coop for your bird’s well-being and comfort.
Learning how to take care of your chickens and their coop isn’t complicated. You have to maintain the rhythm of keeping your coop clean to keep your birds healthy and happy.
Daily Coop Maintenance Tasks
Maintaining your coop’s daily tasks is relatively easy. You need time and patience to do all these maintenance tasks regularly. Actually, you don’t have many options other than cleaning the coops for taking care of your chickens.
However, the daily chicken coop maintenance checklists are:
1. Refresh The Water
Each day, your first step to maintain the coop is to empty the Waterer and refresh the water. Per day your birds need to drink fresh water. If your birds drink dirty water, they can quickly become dehydrated.
Straws, shavings, and poop can mix in the water throughout the day. Consuming such water will make your chicken sick, and the dirty water may lead to worms.
Therefore daily, refresh the water. Sometimes you may be required to change your coop’s water two times a day if you find any sliminess or debris in the container.
2. Clean The Food Containers & Water Bowls
Another part of your coop’s regular maintenance is cleaning the feed containers and water bowls. For regular cleaning, use warm water and dish soap. Rinse the water bowls.
After that, refill it. Also, you can use oxygen bleach or chlorine bleach to sanitize the water container. Thoroughly rinse it.
3. Collect Eggs
If your chickens are laying eggs regularly, then you must collect eggs every day. It is another part of maintaining your coop. Every day collecting eggs will maximize the number of freshened eggs and minimize the cracked eggs.
4. Feed Your Chickens
You can free-feed your birds with a sizable hanging feeder. And in the hanging feeder, you can add the chicken feed when required. Or, each day, you can feed them by setting a specific amount.
5. Observe Your Chicken
You may wonder if observing the flock is a part of coop maintenance. We are telling you that, yes it is. You must observe your chicken to ensure they are not living in a dirty coop.
Also, you need to observe them to ensure they are healthy. Alert and active chickens with smooth feathers and bright eyes are a good sign.
Monthly Chicken Coop Maintenance Checklist
Are you thinking, after maintaining the daily cleaning routine, why do you need to follow the monthly coop maintenance checklist? Regular cleaning isn’t enough to protect your chicken from viruses and disease.
It will harm your bird’s health if you won’t change the bedding or freshen the nest boxes for a long time. So, this is a crucial step when you are aiming to ensure a healthy flock for a long time. Now check out the monthly coop maintenance tasks below:
1. Manage Your Coop’s Bedding
How you should manage the bedding in your coop depends on which method you are using. If your coop is small, then at least monthly changing your coop’s bedding is normal. But if you have a larger coop, we encourage you to use the deep litter method.
In the deep litter method, your chicken’s bedding should be 3 – 4 inches at the beginning. Every month you must add bedding until it becomes 6 inches or plus.
Remove all the bedding in the deep litter method at least twice a year. Or, by composting chicken litter in the garden, you can use it as bedding as it is rich in nitrogen.
2. Sanitize The Waterer
An important chicken coop maintenance tip is deep cleaning the water containers at least once a month. The simplest cleaning process is at ten parts water use at least 1 part bleach. Then using warm water and dish soap, scrub the Waterer.
After that, remove all the bleach from the container / Waterer by rinsing it well. You must rinse the container / Waterer with soap and warm water before refilling it with fresh water.
3. Freshen The Nest Boxes
The nest box’s bedding becomes soiled with broken eggs and poop over time. So you must clean the bedding in the nest box monthly. Put the fresh and new bedding material in the nest box by pulling out the dirty parts.
The clean bedding in the nest box encourages your hen’s laying within it. Moreover, frequently changing the bedding makes the egg-cleaning job easier.
Quarterly Chicken Coop Maintenance Tasks
Let’s look closely at each maintenance task to see why they are essential for keeping your coop clean.
1. Sanitize & Deep Clean Your Coop
Every 4 – 6 months or quarterly in a year, remove everything from your chicken coop. Then using 1 part bleach to 10 parts water wash down your coop’s all surfaces. We recommend you follow this maintenance tip when contagious diseases affect your flock.
Scheduling the quarterly deep cleaning day is a must, irrespective of how neat and clean you keep your coop. As a part of quarterly maintenance, take an entire day to clean your coop’s all bedding. Also, your coop’s surface and roasts scrape old dropping off. After that, scrub and sweep the coop.
Usually, hens are dusty, and they accumulate the dust layer in their coop. Cleaning the layered dust around your chicken coop ensures healthier and more effective respiratory tracts. We suggest you put extra effort into cleaning your chicken’s feeders and waterers.
Some chicken coop owners cut down the mites by using diatomaceous earth sprinkling for deep cleaning. If your chicken eats a bit of it, don’t worry, it’s safe for them.
2. Prepare For Winter
Another quarterly maintenance task is to prepare your coop for winter. In winter, the most critical job for a chicken coop owner is to take care of their birds. So, during your quarterly maintenance, prepare your coop that way if it’s become closer to winter.
You must take care of your chicken and make them ready for the freezy winter weather. If necessary, arrange heaters for your chicken.
Also, change the lighting condition within the coop for your chicken. Ensure that your chicken has enough roosting space within the coop and will stay warm in winter.
3. Arrange Clean & Dry Bedding
Every backyard coop owner has a different idea of handling and maintaining their coop. And the same goes for coop cleaning. The coop and its bedding cleaning process aren’t the same for every coop owner.
Some owners may change the bedding every month. Some may change it every 2-3 months, while others may change it quarterly. Following the deep litter method changing bedding once or twice a year is ok.
But while replacing and putting in the new bedding, you must ensure it is clean and dry. Regardless of your coop managing style, we recommend you change the bedding quarterly.
However, even if you don’t change the bedding, you must ensure your coop is dry. Also, you must keep the bedding clean and dry to ensure that ammonia won’t build up from the droppings of your flock. Keeping your coop dry is a must to prevent or eliminate the growth of ammonia.
Annual Chicken Coop Maintenance Tasks
You must follow the annual chicken coop checklist along with the daily, monthly, and quarterly tasks. Annual chicken coop cleaning from top to bottom is crucial to ensure your chicken’s perfect raising.
However, follow these tips and give a clean coop to your chicken flock.
1. Thoroughly Clean Your Chicken Shed
Annually you must clean your chicken coop thoroughly. You must remove your coop’s bedding, nesting materials, feed, water containers, etc. Remove all the items from your coop and vacuum your coop’s interior surfaces.
The experienced chicken coop owners suggest using the solution for thoroughly cleaning your coop. The cleaning solution should be 1 part dish soap and ten parts water. The thorough cleaning involves rinsing all the items well, including the feeder and Waterer.
After rinsing the items, dry them properly before you fill them with fresh food and water. Also, ensure your coop is dry perfectly before putting in the new bedding. If you are confused about using harsh chemicals for cleaning your coop, you can also use homemade coop cleaner.
2. Repair Your Coop Completely
During the annual maintenance, check the infrastructure of your coop. If anything becomes damaged or you need to repair or replace them, do that.
Repair your coop entirely if needed, along with changing the bedding replace the wood in it. Also, refresh litter in all areas.
End Note
After going through the above guide, you have clear insight regarding the chicken coop maintenance checklist. All these tips above are essential to keep your backyard chickens healthy and happy.
Rearing your backyard chickens can be unique and fun if you follow your coop’s maintenance tips perfectly. The clean coop can ensure healthy and continuous egg-laying chicken. Therefore you must recognize the importance of caring for your chicken coop.
