Why? Because I like to overbuild things. Chickens dig and scratch in the earth. They are mini rototillers. That area of my yard has a lot of clay from when we dug these two 10'x4'x4' pits for the shop rain wells....

..and the topsoil has a fair amount of clay in it as well. Add scratching and digging and you get muddy chickens. I'm build a base, then adding 4-6" of sand on top to give them a dryer run.

Happy chicken lay more eggs.

Sure could have used some of KK's help yesterday digging trenches.