The Great Winter Coop Humidity/Ventilation Experiment! Post Your Results Here!

[centrarchid]

You have another thermal engine operating late in the day. What is it?

 

[mobius]

I see that! I don't know! The coop is often just a couple degrees warmer than outside even with venting, when empty. Which is interesting...in and of itself...the straw on floor, the snow on the roof provides some insulation. But this IS a difference....only thing I can think is the chickens may have been in and out of the coop eating and getting ready for bed, you know, putting on jammies, brushing their teeth...

I will keep an eye on it cause it is a weird finding. I will observe them today. I did put scratch down the day before IN the coop before bed, so they might have been in there looking for more. To fill those crops.

The other possibility is that I may have used Accuweather for outside temp. I don't think so though. Accuweather varies a lot from my outside house temps, usually about five degrees colder) and I usually use a remote outside thermometer checked against an analog thermometer which closely match. It may be attributed to operator error.

 

[centrarchid]

Think about getting into car even on coldest day around or shortly afternoon.

 

[Beekissed]

Factoring in position to the sun? Could be the sun hits it more late in the day, as it does my own coop, and even on the coldest days that sun does manage to warm the coop...especially now that I have a clear tarp on it.

 

[mobius]

It might be thermal heat retained, yes, but the coop gets east sun. We did have sun yesterday, but not in late afternoon. Curiouser and curiouser, said Alice. I will keep an eye out.

 

[mobius]

By the way, we are featured on the Home Page, guys!

 

[Beekissed]

Congrats!!!!

Could be that huge thermal mass under the coop that retained the sun's warmth and then releases it towards evening?

 

[centrarchid]

You building is likely storing heat in materials other than the air. It does not take much light to warm things. My birds in free-range will often go to brushy areas with lots of brown showing. Brown soaks up heat and brush slows air flow reducing heat loss through convection. Birds are extremely good at findings those locations and you can feel it too when going out and getting down at their level. Wild animals also do such in what is called yarding up. Sometimes your neighbor replaces the brush as a method of slowing airflow.

 

[mobius]

Congrats!!!!

Could be that huge thermal mass under the coop that retained the sun's warmth and then releases it towards evening?

Now that is a possibility...the chickens moved a bunch of straw UNDER the coop just yesterday, at my request

. It is pretty well loaded under there and they like to cuddle under there on the coldest days. Hmmm. And i know by "huge thermal mass" you mean the ground lol!

 

[bullets]

If you get get a chance I would place both of your thermometers outside for an hour or two and see if they are giving you the same reading. It's a likely possibility one of them is reading differently than the other. Even if they are both off a few degrees on accuracy it's okay for this experiment as long as they both show the same readings on humidity accuracy and temp in the same environment.