Chickens poop. A lot. A standard-sized laying hen produces as much as 4 ounces of manure a day. Chickens can’t control when they defecate. They go all of the time. They poop when they’re sleeping. It accumulates under the roosts.

Chicken manure is 75% water. It’s high in nitrogen. As it decomposes, it gives off ammonia fumes. (Which is a good reason to have your roosts well off of the floor of the coop – so your hens don’t breathe in the damp, caustic air while they sleep.)

Flies breed in rich, soft, moist manure.

I hate flies. They’re bothersome. They carry disease. In a rare case, they cause the worst thing ever – fly strike. I do everything that I can to limit the population of flies in my coops.

The first line of defense is the most obvious – remove the manure! I’ve written about manure management here. But, since chickens poop all day long, and you can’t follow them around with a scoop and bucket, you’ll have to take other steps.

Use bedding that is dry and absorbent. Pine shavings work well. A product like Koop Clean, which is chopped chaff mixed with a desiccant, is especially drying. There’s manure right in the center of this photo – dried out and so not a place that flies can breed.

If you have dropping boards (or, in the case of my Big Barn, a beam,) scrape the manure off daily. Despite the maintenance, during fly season, I see tiny immature flies on the damp wood.

I kill them with a spritz of citrus vinegar.

This summer, I saw those immature flies on my windows. But, someone else also saw them – these insect-eating insects! This is why I don’t use pesticides. Over the course of three days, these bugs (can anyone identify them for me?) scarfed up the tiny flies, decimating the fly population, and then were gone.

I’m a big fan of fly strips. Before those brilliant insect-killing insects appeared, the ones hanging over the goat stall looked like this:

Fly strips are very effective! (Just make sure that you don’t hang them where a flighty hen can tangle in them. Read about Florence’s adventure here.)

With all of my management techniques – a clean, dry coop, citrus vinegar, fly strips, and working with beneficial insects, I’ve kept the flies in check. Even late in August when the pests should be at their worst, look at this. It’s been hanging for 24 hours, and it had almost no flies to trap.

My hens thank me.

It’s been a very good summer for sunflowers. I decided to take photos of the ones that are currently blooming in my garden.

Goldfinches have been dining on the flowers, but I don’t mind. I like how sunflowers are both beautiful and useful. I thought that a full-face image of one that had been pecked at would be interesting.

After I downloaded it on my computer I noticed something. The birds aren’t the only ones feasting. I zoomed in.

Photography can separate you from the world. Holding a camera in front of your face becomes an excuse not to interact with those around you. Looking through the view finder can reduce your vision to a small rectangle. I’ve never understood parents who watch their children’s every move from behind a camera because the act of recording sets you apart. But, there’s a flip side to photography. It can help you to see the details. The very act of looking for something to photograph makes you more aware  – of pattern, color, beauty – and sometimes of that tiny camouflaged insect dining away on a sunflower.

Lily is on patrol. She is keeping the garden free of vermin that gnaw at the butternut squash.

So far, so good.

Do you have (or had) a good farm dog? Brag about your pup in the comments. There are few things as cheering as a good dog story (and heaven knows, what with what’s on the nightly news we could use some good dog tales.) Don’t hold back on the effusive praise!

It’s just a coincidence that two podcasts they I took part in this month released their episodes the same week. I guess that I have a lot to say about chickens, because there’s almost no overlap in the content of these conversations.

I’ve followed the Root Simple blog for years. Unlike many who promote urban sustainability, the couple behind Root Simple are not didactic. They maintain their ethics, but with a good dose of humor and practicality. Also, they have a few passions that I like hearing about. Erik has delved deeply into bread baking, and Kelly adores cats. (She should never think that there are too many internet cat photos – Kelly, go ahead and post more!) Erik and Kelly keep chickens in urban Los Angeles, and I was delighted to be asked to be a guest on their podcast.

Kelly and Erik have a small urban yard filled with plants appropriate for southern California conditions. I so enjoy reading their blog posts about fruits that I could never grow here (grapefruit!) and their experiments with straw bale vegetable beds. Erik reads my blog and watches the cams to see what rain looks like :) I took this photo this morning, of dew on a brussels sprouts leaf. It’s for you, Erik!