Any info on Automatic door opener/closers??

[kmchickens]

Now that it is dark earlier and I come home way after dark, my hens are having trouble with the opossums. I am looking for any info on purchasing an automatic door for my coop to help with this problem. I came home last night and found my big white hen sitting in the middle of the backyard in the snow.... again!!

 

[Chirpy]

Hi km chickens: I don't have any experience with these but would love to have one someday. I know it's been discussed here before so I would suggest you do a "Search" at the top of the page and put in 'automatic door' and see what you can find from old threads. Good luck and I know others with experience will chime in here soon.

 

[GloriaH]

Hello kmchickens, Welcome! I too would love to have one. I thought they were expensive.

 

[silkiechicken]

You could probably make one with a motor and a switch depending on the type of door...

My semi auto door closer is my little brother.

 

[SugarLandChickenMan]

I saw one of these. Don't know if your hens would wear a collar!

http://www.smarthome.com/6191d.html

 

[Smitty's Farm]

Try this link. Many BYC members have ordered one from here. You can search old post to see pictures. They love it. I have been wanting to order one for a year. Merry x-mas to me!

http://www.chicken-house.com

 

[WoodlandWoman]

We got ours from Wells Poultry in the UK. It came right away, like the next week. Foy's Pigeon Supply in the US now carries the same ones. They are made in Europe.

I totally love it and wish we had gotten one years ago.

 

[suburbanhomesteader]

What she said.

It took a couple of weeks for me to figure out how to get the timer/automatic opener working on mine, but now that I have, I LOVE it!

And the girls have a completely draft-free home (insulated with Reflectix foil-bubble-foil) at night now; it's amazing how toasty it stays in there. It's 6x8 with 7' ceilings, and hasn't been below 40 so far. Tonight the temp is supposed to drop to 28, so I'll let you know how low the inside temp gets tonight.

 

[Poison Ivy]

I love mine bought it back in june before I went on vacation. I plan on ordering another one later on for my other coop. I have mine set on the timer which is great because I have a few girls who stay out later then the others.

 

[WoodlandWoman]

You can also adjust the light sensitivity so that it opens and closes when it's brighter or darker. You just use a screwdriver to slightly turn the potentiometer. It comes with instructions.

Ours also has a remote sensor, for our shed coop. It's just a sensor on the end of a cable, that goes through a very small hole in the wall. That way the opener is reading the outside light level, instead of the indoor light level. This is good for coops that have lighting in them. You don't want to have the door open in the dark, because you turned on the light in the coop to do chores after work in the winter or because you use supplemental lighting. The timer would also solve that problem, we just didn't want to have to keep adjusting it for the changing daylight hours, so we went with the remote sensor model.

The Dec/Jan issue of Backyard Poultry has a full page ad for Foy's on the back cover and it lists the door and all it's various options on it, with pricing. I think they may have improved their web site since we first looked at it, too.