Nas Mus

I've stopped using standard brush and tootpaste also. I have recently started using something used throughout the asian world in the olden days (these days they also seem to be resorting to toothpastes) called miswaak. It's a twig of some tree and it works wonders.

My gums have always bled. They stopped bleeding after a week or so of using miswaak and became much stronger.
Initially I thought my teeth were going yellow, but now there are clean and getting cleaner and whiter everyday with the miswaak.
It costs about 50p here in the UK for one miswaak which can easily last over a month of regular usage (about half a dollar I think that is)
You literally only need to use it for a about 30 seconds-minute after you eat and you can carry it around with you in your pocket, it's only a twig.

It's also supposed to have other effects due to nutrients and natural stuff in the twig like reducing phlegm - but i've never really had a phlegm problem so can't tell. Supposed to be good for memory too.

For me it's just a hassle free, natural method of keep my teeth clean and gums strong.

Thanks for the help and suggestions everyone.

Mark, your setup seems interesting. But I'm not sure I understand exactly what you are doing to get "In one year the seven hens on seventy square metres have added seventy five mm of magnificent fertile soil"..?
If you have a setup with 7 chickens giving extra fertile soil in just 70 square metres, then that is incredible, normally that many chickens in that much space would make soil so hot with their poop after a year, nothing would grow in it. Could you explain a bit more in detail please? I'm not sure if it's something to do with the horse manure or the corn you are growing?

For me, I still think the best option for the amount of space and chickens I have is to have small areas (about 1 metre square) around the yard with fast growing weeds like chickweed in one area, clover in another, comfrey in another and maybe some mixed weeds in another. Each area will be covered with wire mesh (low to the ground) so the chickens cannot get into that 1 metre square and completely kill that particular weed off, but they can eat whatever grows out of the chickenwire whether from the top or from the sides (and with a a good few square metre patches of fast growing weed, they should have a fair bit of munch on most days hopefully). As for the rest of the bare yard where nothing is growing (and really that should end up just being a lot of paths all around those square metres, fruit trees and shrubs), I think woodchip mulch is really my only option, I don't think any other groundcover can survive the chickens.

Leila Rich wrote:
While it would be theoretically possible to have that many chickens on 700 square feet,
if they're not being rotated, no matter what mulch you have it is more than likely to quickly become a smelly, denuded desert.
and from my perspective, a poor environment for chickens.

I'm very much in favour of chip, but I'd see it as a possible solution for your current situation, not as an opportunity to add more chickens.

I know, I would never have that many chickens in that small an area. I just wanted to see if it would be possible to stop the soil from getting so much nitrogen that nothing would grow in future. So basically, sticking decomposing wood around areas with an overdose of chicken poop is one way of helping soil regain or keep it's health. I guess that would work with all high carbon products?

Chicken poop feeds excess nitrogen, woodchips decomposing take out the excess nitrogen? surely this is a perfect combo to keep soil in good shape ready for planting when the need arises by simply removing woodchip mulch in the areas to plant in?

I'm not sure if I made sense in my last post, but I thought woodchips taking out the nitrogen from the soil is good in this scenario, because chicken poop has a lot of nitrogen, so the woodchips and chicken poop balance each other out (obviously depending on chicken numbers and how much woodchip mulch there is)?

Also, harwood woodchips last about 2-3 years?

mixture of fast growing stuff sounds great.

Ok, so I've just learned that decomposing mulch from things like wood chip takes out a lot of nitrogen from the soil.

Now a lot of chicken poop kills off soil so that nothing grows in it. But if the soil has been mulched with wood-chip, then does that mean I can actually keep a lot more chickens, say 20, without worrying about the soil becoming dead due to too much chicken poop (my biggest worry is the soil becoming dead due to too many chickens on too small a piece of land)? After all the excess nitrogen in the chicken poop will be balanced out by the decomposing mulch? Or is it something else in chicken poop that kills off the soil for years? If it is just the nitrogen, which is balanced out by the decomposing mulch, then it is mulch all the way for me.

Lelila, it's ok I did not take anything as disparaging in any way.

John, what do you have that regenerates after 2 weeks of chickens ripping it up? 2 week recovery period after chicken rip is not bad, standard lawn grass would take atleast a month.

You all seem to have me reconsidering the mulch. I guess theres not much choice when you have a greater number of chickens than the amount of land can handle.

I have considered paddocks, but again not keen, as it reduces their daily free range space, and yard is small enough as it is. If I had bigger plot then definitely would use paddocks.
again not keen on tractor, if i was going to limit free range space in any way, it would be paddocks - least hassle. (I don't know whether i'm being lazy or want things to run as naturally untouched as possible)

Thanks for the responses.

I'm in zone 8 in UK (our UK zones are based on the same scales as the US ones, so no difference there). Soil is clayish loam.
Unfortunately, our houses and gardens over here are no where near as big as US ones. My chickens free range in 700 sq ft of my garden. 11 chickens.

I like the idea of meadow mix, but I don't think it will last in this much space with 11 chickens unless I get certain types of seeds to withstand the chickens, but I don't know what.

Wild strawberry seems like a very feasible idea. If it holds out as well as you describe it may be just the thing. Do your chickens also eat the leaves, or just the berries and does eating a lot of red eat the colour of their yolk or anything?

I don't want mulch because:

1. Extra work
2. Extra cost
3. Chickens flinging it everywhere.

However I will be composting around the trees and shrubs, if that can count as mulch (even though the chickens will be flinging that also).

Yeah I know it's not very "gardeny" yet, I do plan on getting more variety (probably with a vine layer next), but it's just a case of what can withstand the chickens. The most important step I need to work out right now is what groundcover/s. Clover is good, but it will not last with the chickens in this much space.

I think I will be better of with groundcover the chickens will not eat. Atleast it will stay there. Then I can have small areas with things like clover and chickweed that are covered with mesh, so the chickens can't destroy the whole patch, they can only eat what grows through the mesh.

What are good invasive, evergreen groundcovers that can take foot traffic but do not grow more than about 4 inches?

I need to use them instead of mulch to cover the whole garden where I do not have anything growing (which will mainly be fruit trees and fruit shrubs), and also it would be good if my chickens can munch on them, but not enough to completely kill them off like they did with turf grass. The other option I can consider is a groundcover with all the above qualities except that the chickens won't eat it but can still walk on it (chickens can munch on fallen fruit from tress and shrubs).

Is that asking too much from a groundcover, or a mix of groundcovers?

thanks in advance, and sorry if this is a newb question, i'm new to all this.

Sorry if this is the wrong section. Did a search and could not find anything on goji berry guild. New to permaculture. I was wondering what other types of edible plants go well with goji berries (wolf berries) as a guild? I have chickens, so a lot of my forest garden growing will be with chickens in mind.