DIY tips for creating the Perfect Winter Dust Bath

Author: Esther Donohue

Your backyard chickens need a dust bath in the winter almost more than they do in the summer months. During the winter months, your chickens will spend days or even months inside the coop, where the environment is perfect for external parasites to thrive in.

Our chickens spend about 3 months inclosed inside our chicken coop, it’s not ideal but our temperatures dip into the negatives often here in North Dakota, we hit minus -45  this past weekend! with the windchill hitting minus -65. 

So our chickens and ducks stay inside an insulated and heated chicken coop or they would freeze.

During these long winter days, it’s important to provide our chickens with what they need to stay healthy and prevent external parasites and respiratory issues.

We do this by regular coop maintenance, providing good quality feed, fresh water, grit, and a dustbathing area, plus they get table scraps and flock blocks to prevent boredom. 

Our hens reward us by providing eggs all winter, they do slow down egg production but we are still getting about 2 dozen a day, plus about 3-5 duck eggs a day lately, which is surprising! 

In this post, I’m going to share with you some tips on how we created our DIY winter dust bathing area for our chickens.

 If you’re looking for DIY dust bath ideas for the outdoors, read my blog post on easy and cheap DIY dust bathing ideas, and if you’re looking for a dust bath recipe that explains the ideal dust bathing ingredients, you can read all about that in my previous blog post.

Why your chickens need a winter dust bath.

Depending on your climate, your hens may be outdoors still or they may spend more time indoors, inside the chicken coop. Winter conditions vary throughout the states, they can be damp, wet, foggy, or snow-covered and cold.

Whatever your conditions are providing your hens with a dust bath will ensure they prevent external parasites such as mites, lice, and fleas during the winter months. 

It will also provide them with a social activity to help break the endless cycle of the winter blues or cabin fever as we call it. 

Dust bathing is a natural behavior that all birds take part in, it’s a way to clean excess oil, prevent unwanted pests, remove dead skin cells, and regulate body temperature.  All very important factors in the winter months. 

Easy, cheap DIY winter dust bath ideas

Dust bathing containers don’t need to be expensive or time-consuming. It’s fairly simple find a container that will hold dirt, that’s large enough for a chicken or two to fit into and fill it with loose soil or fine sand mixture. 

Below are some containers that are easy, cheap and work great during the winter months. 

1. Large cat litter tray

Litter boxes are easy to buy and use inside the coop. They provide the perfect shallow basins to hold your dust bath ingredients. 

You can cheap litter boxes at pet supply stores, feed stores, and at any big-box store. 

During the summer months simply remove clean, dry, and store till next winter. 

2. Small kiddie pool

Kiddie pools have two sizes, there’s the larger version that works great outside but may take up a bit more space inside the coop, and than there is a mini kiddie pool that works perfectly inside the chicken coop. 

These pools are cheap and easy to find at dollar stores, online, or at big-box stores. You may want to purchase the pool during the summer months, as they are usually not in stock during the winter months. 

If you have someone that has a kiddie pool with a hole, repurpose it into a dust bath! 

3. Large plastic tote 

Any large plastic tote will work great as long as the sides are not that deep. I find the the under the bed totes work great. The rectangular totes. They fit right against a wall and out of the way inside the coop. Plus they have the perfect depth for a good amount of loose dirt. 

Looking to not spend any money look at thrift stores or ask your friends if they have a tote laying around that lost its lid, we all have those kinda totes! 

4. Galvanized metal tub

If you have a round galvanized tub sitting around, this will make a great dust bath. I personally love the look of old galvanized metal, so I am always picking up galvanized metal containers to plant flowers in and use around the farm.

Even if they have holes, they work great as a dust bath container. I pick mine up at antique stores, Junk markets during the summer months and I have even found some at rummage sales.

5. Fire pit ring

Now this depends if you have a dirt or concrete floor in your coop or not.

I personally wouldn’t use a fire ring in our chicken coop, we have a wooden floor and I don’t want to mess with trying to clean up dirt off the floor.

We will be replacing our floor eventually with concrete, but that’s a few years off.  

If your coop has a dirt floor or concrete a fire ring will work great to keep the dust bath materials contained and the chickens will enjoy using it. Once again look for an old or used one.

6. Old Tire 

You can easily build a false bottom into a old tire, or leave it open depending on your chicken coops floor.  

I have seen people paint and personalize their tires, so have at it. You can use it outside during the summer months as a dust bath also, or just store in the coop when not in use. 

We made it a habit to keep our used tires on the farm, we use them as spare tires for the trailers, usually our pick box trailers that are used for our fire wood. 

Finding the perfect location for the dust bath container, inside the chicken coop

Depending on the size of your chicken coop, finding a location for the dust bath container should be a easy and simple task. Keep these few pointers in mind.

• Keep the dust bath container away from moisture and waterers.
• Locate the container away from roosting bars, or it will quickly fill full of droppings.
• If you have a window that gets sun, locate the dust bath in the sun. Chickens love a sunny spot to dust bath in.
• If you have no window locate the dust bath near the coop light

We have our dust bath located in the corner of our coop, I actually may be adding a raised loft to the coop this summer to provide them with a designated area for dust bathing, grit, oyster shell, think a spa treatment area for my hens. They will love it! 

Dust bathing ingredients 

Check out my simple and easy recipe for indoor dust baths or outdoor.

 This recipe covers all the information you need to know about the best material to add to your own dust bath from food-grade diatomaceous earth, wood ash, loose soil, and sandy soil (play sand), and wood shavings. 

Plus additional add-ons you can add to your dust bath and the health benefits.

Maintaining your winter dust bath

During the winter months, it’s important to keep a clean and dry dust bath and chicken coop. If you don’t clean out the bedding regularly inside the chicken coop it can quickly become wet. 

Make sure your coop has good ventilation during the winter months, we have windows built into our coop, we crack them when the weather permits to get fresh air inside the coop, this prevents respiratory issues within your flock.  

If you don’t have windows make sure you have ventilation holes, if you have a drafty coop, no need to worry about adding ventilation. 

Basic maintenance for your chicken dust bathing container is fairly simple.

• 1. Keep it clean, remove any unwanted debris, such as bedding or chicken poop.
• Make sure it doesn’t get wet or moist.
• Make sure the soil/mixture stays loose.
• Change out the dust bath materials if they become dirty, compacted, or wet.  

If you clean the dust bath on a regular basis you will have some happy and healthy chickens. 

The Health benefits of providing a dust bathing area far outweigh the cons, if you haven’t added one to your winter care list, do so now.

From our own experience when we have a dust bath that’s easily accessible to our chickens we have never had a major issue with mites, fleas, or lice within our backyard flock.