Composting Chicken Manure

There are a few things you can do to compost chicken manure. You can compost it in piles, in compost bins, in compost tumblers or with worms.

First it is recomended to start with 1 cubic yard piles, 3 ft. x 3 ft. x 3 ft. The mixture should be 2 parts bedding to 1 part chicken manure, you could try 1:1 ratio. Then wet the pile, it should be as wet as a wrung out sponge, let the pile heat, will do this on it own, to between 130 to 150 degrees F. but not over 160 deg. F. for 3 days. The 130 to 150 kills the pathogens but going above 160 can kill beneficial microorganisms and slow the composting process. Turn the pile, mix it well. It is recomended to do this 3 times then cover the pile loosely and let it cure 45 to 60 days. If you use a compost tumbler after the first heating the time should be reduced to 2 or 3 weeks. At the end of curing most of the material is dark, crumbly and sweet-smelling like soil.

Note that the bedding is brown or carbon material and the chicken manure is green or nitrogen material. Other browns are dead leaves, cardboard, twigs and stems. Greens are grass clippings.

Worm composting,
Plenty of people have successfully used chicken manure for vermicomposting. The key will be to soak it down, mix it with C-rich materials, the bedding, and let it age for quite awhile. The water helps drain off the excess salts.

Let it sit for awhile (maybe a couple of weeks) without adding more chicken manure, then dig some of it out and see how it looks and smells. You definitely shouldn’t add worms as long as there is a strong odor of ammonia. It should almost get to the point of having an ‘earthy’smell. Your best bet is to test it out on a small scale before adding the worms. Take some of the material and put it in a small bin then add a small handful of worms. See if they bury down in it or want to leave the bin as fast as possible. Red wigglers are the best worms to use. You need to keep the the worm compost moist or the worms will die.