My Umbrella Dusting Station For Chickens + DIY So You Can Make One Too - Pardon My Dust

Fun, warm days slinging treats in green grasses with my butt planted in a lawn chair enjoying a micro-brew with the chickens at my feet is always a good memory.
A sweet, sweet memory.
But here's the kicker:
Some days it's about survival: snow, frost bite, frozen mud, or sand bagging the coop so it doesn't flood or, or, or, in my case, tarping the roof so the rickety thing (circa 1946) doesn't collapse under the heavy rain fall here in Northern California.
I get a lot of questions about the dusting space for my chickens and the gigantic umbrella.
So, I set aside the time and put together the details so you can make one too.
Here's the thing:
Your backyard chickens need to dust year around.
Like every day.
Even more so in the Winter when the air is crisp, freezing, wet and just damn cold.
You know how your skin gets dry and wind whipped?
They get it too.
Even with all their feathers.
Ahnnnnnd: chickens in Winter are more prone to pests (mites, lice, etc).
Because backyard chickens rely on dusting in dirt (or dirt-like-matter) as their main way for keeping clean (in addition to preening), it's even more crucial to provide an area for them to do so when they can't do it on their own: frozen ground, no access to dirt, snow-on-everything.
Because, you see: backyard chickens also don't like to dust in the mud.
1.) Enough bags of compost/potting soil (NO Vermiculite or Perlite in the mix (example shown below)) to fill your tub, fire ring, bucket or bin half-way. Dirt and/or shavings will do just fine too.

The opening needs to be 2 inches wide so the handle of the umbrella will slide right in (see photo below).
* Pro Tip: most local (not big-box) hardware stores have a department with a tool that will cut your pole to length so you don't have to buy one that is 6 or 8 feet long.

Once you have all your items:
- Container
- Umbrella
- Soil
- Pardon My Dust
- Support pole
Put your container in place.
Repeat Pardon My Dust application at least weekly.
Depending on the size of your container, refill with dry soil when the levels lower.
Lastly: snap a photo and tag me @treats4chickens with #pardonmydust. I'd love to see what you create.

I filled an old large tire with playground sand. The umbrella needs to be added but they will not step foot in the new dust bath. Should I switch the sand out for dirt?
How do you keep the chickens off the umbrella so it doesn’t collapse and break?
Help! I have three 6 inch plastic tubes that are attached to the coop wall for feeding my 10 girls.At the bottom of the tube, I’ve attached an elbow pipe, so that the feed catches there and the girls can pick out their favorite looking seed. This has worked beautifully until about 2 weeks ago. I changed feed from just pellets (which they were not eating) to a multigrain-ridiculously expensive-organic feed. I mixed this up with the undesirable pellets and filled the feeding tubes. For several days now I find piles of the food at the base of the tubes. Wasted food. I shovel it back into the tubes, but would really like to know if there is something I am doing wrong? Maybe the combination of feed was a mistake?
Is the umbrella just a large golf type umbrella?
I don’t see snow on the ground where you show your dusting station. Does it need to go in the coop during the winter?