Does anyone out there know how long my chicken manure mixed with their woodshaving bedding needs to sit before I can till it in my raised bed?
I got the hens last fall and have been piling the kit and kaboodle into a black plastic covered pallet compost bin (3x3ft). It is moist and at least 4 months old but still looks like bedding and poop mixed together.
Any ideas?
First spring with hens....

it's going to depend on your humidity some, I would think--if it's too dry things don't really rot as quickly, they sort of mummify! (and get infested with ants).

I would wait at least 8 months total if not more. you know, when it doesn't look like wood shavings and poop anymore. I tend to get too eager and put horse manure on stuff too early--hasn't hurt much yet, but horse poop isn't as hot as chicken.

Wood shavings require nitrogen to break down, it could take them years. They will compete with your vegetables for nitrogen, so if you do incorporate them, you'll need to add extra nitrogen for the veggies.

It's better to bury them in a trench, leave them until they break down, then use the composted wood shavings, but it could take a year or more.

If they are pine or redwood they will put out a no-growth chemical until they are finished breaking down. But once you can get the wood to be fluffy in your fingers, it's done.

My great grandfather would save a big bunch of chicken sweepings and till them into his onion bed each fall. Next year he would plant and would get some of the hottest and most flavorfull onions I've ever seen! He didn't worry about composting them, just a few months aging underground was enough to do the trick. Just toss them over to the side till fall, or start a couple of compost piles with the sweepings and some shredded newspaper and grass. Piles that use chicken manure tend to get really hot and become high nitro compost that is great for side-dressing fruiting plants.