Is there room for a sheep in the henhouse?

A sheep in the henhouse may evoke images akin to a bull in a china shop! No, you shouldn’t keep a sheep in the chicken coop. But what about the sheep’s fleece?

If you have a few sheep along with your chicken hobby then you will most likely have some spare wool hanging around. Not all wool is created equally and some is valuable and some is worthless.

At our small farm (Wooly Acres) we divide our wool carefully after shearing time in the spring. The fleece is unfurled onto a large table where we carefully skirt it, removing less desireable parts, especially the wool from the neck, head and legs.

The best wool is bagged and made ready for show and sale. The middlin’ stuff is still saleable but instead of going through the hassle of that we donate it to the local 4-H spinning and weaving club. The poopy wool loaded with manure tags (we call them dingleberries) goes straight to the compost pile. But that still leaves a category of Unclaimed Wool.

This last category is not worth spinning for handspinners and probably has hay bits terminally embedded deep within. But it is dingleberry-free. Previously I have taken this wool to the local wool pool where I invariably do not earn enough to pay for the gas to drive there in the first place. I was to the point of deciding to compost it too.

Then someone gave me the idea of bedding the chickens nesting box with wool. The Unclaimed Wool would be PERFECT for this task. What could be better than providing my broody hens with a warm, soft nest, that applied a little natural lanolin to their nether parts as a bonus. It’s practically like a day at the spa!

In true scientific fashion I filled half the nesting boxes with wool and the other half with traditional straw. Then I waited for them to “flock” to the luxurious option I had provided. Well, to be honest, they avoided the wooly boxes at first. Actually, some avoided the straw ones, too, by kicking it all out of the box and laying the egg on a pure wooden board—Puritan style.

A month has now passed with my experiment and the results are mixed. Though not an overwhelming success, it appears that some hens personally prefer the wool and some prefer the straw (and one likes the plain, unforgiving wood). I am hoping that as temperatures continue to plummet for winter that they will see the benefit of a wooly nest. But if they don’t, I am content at this point to offer them choices– a true luxury in the coop!

Article: Julie Helms Twitter: @julie_helms E-mail Her