Raising 9 roosters to clear soil for gardening

Chickens are used in food forest building to clear soil and fertilize the soil before planting new trees and shrubs, so I thought I can also use them to clear land for gardening. Did it work?

5 roosters in a chicken run

Well, I hate to say that for us it did not. Maybe the roosters are still too young, maybe roosters do not scratch as well as chickens, but to extend our berry garden the clearing that these roosters did is not enough. As you can see on the picture the patch in front of the chicken run is where they where and cleared the ground, but grass started growing again immediately, so this is not good enough to extend our berry garden on.

A patch of cleared pasture, with the chicken run in the back, where the grass is growing trough

As a last resort of trying to get rid of the couch grass, we are now trying out covering the ground with a silage tarp. I am not sure how long this would have to stay on. The sun burns extremely here so, on the black tarp, I hope that the heat will help killing the weeds, especially the rhizome grass. I would like to plant raspberries and strawberries in the fall.

Ground covered with a silage tarp and weight down with tires and wood chips
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Author: beautifulchaosorg

Hi, I am Carolien and I am a Dutch woman trying to build a self sufficient homestead on concrete and rubble. Follow my husband and me on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@straverhomestead9667

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