Any suggestions on how to solve our frostbite problem?

[Bogtown Chick]

We got to -38 and wind this year. I just accept a little frostbite as part of where we live. As long as the chickens feet are not frostbitten I consider it good. If feet or even a toenail get damaged there is a problem.

We have a number of older barn cats with nipped ears as well. I wish there was a way to stop it without micromanaging everything or major changes to the coop... Oh well. My hens are good as are some of the roosters but some roosters now look smooth combed.

I think that's the way we need to be. Is just relax a little bit about these "farm" animals. Do our best so don't have dirty and damp conditions but let it go in our heads that Mother Nature makes her adaptions with a little nip and dubbing here and there. I agree about the feet deal though. That's no good. My roo lost one toe last year.

I remember cats on our farm when I was young with crusty or rounded off ears --a bit shorter-- after a nasty winter. gosh that brings back memories. I also remember having Mom and Dad lifting up the hood of the car in the garage to scoot the cats out from the warm engine block so they wouldn't catch them off gaurd when they started the cars. Or the unfortunate ones that chose to sleep where the bull slept. Winter can be a mean one for Farm cats. But there was always the old Momma Cat that was saavy and smart and knew how to make it year after year.

 

[mrballance]

I think that's the way we need to be. Is just relax a little bit about these "farm" animals. Do our best so don't have dirty and damp conditions but let it go in our heads that Mother Nature makes her adaptions with a little nip and dubbing here and there. I agree about the feet deal though. That's no good. My roo lost one toe last year.

I remember cats on our farm when I was young with crusty or rounded off ears --a bit shorter-- after a nasty winter. gosh that brings back memories. I also remember having Mom and Dad lifting up the hood of the car in the garage to scoot the cats out from the warm engine block so they wouldn't catch them off gaurd when they started the cars. Or the unfortunate ones that chose to sleep where the bull slept. Winter can be a mean one for Farm cats. But there was always the old Momma Cat that was saavy and smart and knew how to make it year after year.

Well said. Trouble is some chickens are pets. Not on my watch, but I understand. If you want pets you have to do something else. Mine are farm animals and I try my best to see that they have a good home. A little scaring is going to happen.

 

[Taffy RIP]

I don't know how large your coop is, but I have a portable coop, quite small, and this year we only had a very mild frostbite problem once, despite being the coldest winter on record, and it was only for the rooster whose comb is enormous.

Each winter I wrap the wired part of the pen (their run) in heavy duty plastic (it looks like a small greenhouse) so that they can go "outside" without going outside. This keeps it quite pleasant even when it is snowing and blowing. I usually open up the door anyway as they like to step out if they can, but on a really cold day it lets too much icy air into the coop.

For the coop part itself, I went and bought a couple of sheets of thin, pink foam insulation at Home Depot and nailed them onto the coop with screws and large washers to hold it. Then I covered this with a tarp (though half the tarp has blown away). My coop is only made of thin plywood, but this thin foam insulation has kept the temperature at or above freezing inside the coop even on the worst nights ... usually on a typical cold night it is around 3 celsius in there, only after days of sustained cold does it dip to just around freezing at night, though it warms up in the day. When it is only a little below freezing (-5, -6 celsius) outside it gets a balmy 10celsius inside the coop at night. I have 11 chickens, so body heat is helping some, but it is much better than last year when I lined the coop with hay bales ... this worked some, but couldn't reach the top of the coop and they all got frostbite, the rooster especially bad.

The insulation cost less than $20 (it is a small coop) and has been just great ... I will just take it off in the spring.

Hope this helps.

 

[Sydney Acres]

I don't know how large your coop is, but I have a portable coop, quite small, and this year we only had a very mild frostbite problem once, despite being the coldest winter on record, and it was only for the rooster whose comb is enormous.

Each winter I wrap the wired part of the pen (their run) in heavy duty plastic (it looks like a small greenhouse) so that they can go "outside" without going outside. This keeps it quite pleasant even when it is snowing and blowing. I usually open up the door anyway as they like to step out if they can, but on a really cold day it lets too much icy air into the coop.

For the coop part itself, I went and bought a couple of sheets of thin, pink foam insulation at Home Depot and nailed them onto the coop with screws and large washers to hold it. Then I covered this with a tarp (though half the tarp has blown away). My coop is only made of thin plywood, but this thin foam insulation has kept the temperature at or above freezing inside the coop even on the worst nights ... usually on a typical cold night it is around 3 celsius in there, only after days of sustained cold does it dip to just around freezing at night, though it warms up in the day. When it is only a little below freezing (-5, -6 celsius) outside it gets a balmy 10celsius inside the coop at night. I have 11 chickens, so body heat is helping some, but it is much better than last year when I lined the coop with hay bales ... this worked some, but couldn't reach the top of the coop and they all got frostbite, the rooster especially bad.

The insulation cost less than $20 (it is a small coop) and has been just great ... I will just take it off in the spring.

Hope this helps.

I have a similar setup for one of my flocks. The house is 3'W X 4'L X 5'H, made of 2X4s and 5/8" (?) plywood, initially painted with Thompsons Water Seal. It roosts between 5 and 9 large birds comfortably (currently six LF Croad Langshans) The top is slightly sloped, and has hinges at the highest edge, so the top can be propped open as high as needed for proper ventilation. There is a 9"W X 12"H opening at the bottom for the birds to get in and out. The entire front comes off for easy cleaning. The perches are wide PVC pipe covered with foam pipe insulation (1-3 layers, depending on the birds), then tightly wrapped with vetrap. This way the perches are large, padded, and poop-proof. The vetrap is changed every 1-2 months, and the pipe insulation 2-3 times a year, as needed for cleanliness and padding. The perches are placed high enough that they're out of any draft from the bottom opening, but not so high that the birds are getting a cross breeze from the top. They're in that sweet spot of quiet but not stagnant air. The house sits on the ground. Inside the house, there is thick plastic directly on the ground to prevent moisture from wicking up, and that is covered by 8-12' of aspen shavings. The poop is typically picked up every 1-2 days in the winter, and every week in the summer, depending on how moist the poop is, how long the night is, and how cold the temperature is.

The house sits inside a 6'W X 12'L X 8'H predator-proof welded wire pen on a wood frame. The welded wire roof of the pen is peaked in the center, and has awnings that extend 18" out on all sides beyond the walls of the pen. The roof is covered with thick clear plastic. There is a large wire door on one end for people, and a small wire door beside it for chickens, both simply framed out with 2X2 wood. The pen has a dirt floor that is covered with a few inches of chopped straw, and the feeder and waterer are in the pen, elevated up on cinder blocks so the birds are eating and drinking at shoulder level, and the bedding doesn't get in the food or water. The straw is replaced whenever it gets too dirty or wet, typically every month. The birds are let out of the pen to free range every day, typically an hour after sunrise (the hawks and eagles hunt most aggressively here immediately after sunrise). During the summer the walls of the pen are left as just wire. When the wind starts blowing rain and snow sideways in fall/winter, I tie sheets to the wire walls. I tried plastic, but found that the wind tore it too easily because the wind couldn't go through it at all, and the humidity was too high in the coop. With thin cloth, the wind is significantly slowed but not 100% stopped, and the humidity can still escape, so the inside of the pen has gentle air movement without drafting, and it is amazingly warm. It's like being inside a tent. The plastic roof retains lots of heat, and the cloth lets out the moisture, so it feels 10-20 degrees warmer in the pen then outside in the open. Inside the house it's even warmer, despite the roof being propped open a bit. I would prefer to use clear plastic to let in more sunlight, but it just wouldn't work for my particular pen in this level of wind.

I built it in 1998, and the house and pen combined cost only a bit more than the tiny little premade "boxes of death" that so many feed stores (and Costco -- such a disappointment, as their products are usually good quality) sell now. It's not elegant, or even pretty, but it was quick to make, inexpensive, and after 16 years is still a comfortable and safe place for my birds. But I have started using earth tone sheets (light brown and greens) instead of white -- that was just too tacky, even for me.

 

[SIMZ]

Well said. Trouble is some chickens are pets. Not on my watch, but I understand. If you want pets you have to do something else. Mine are farm animals and I try my best to see that they have a good home. A little scaring is going to happen.

This is the transition I've been making. In the past, every animal I've had has been a pet, so it's just natural that I try to make chickens my pets, too. It's a definite shift in thinking now that I'm trying the "farming" thing. Raising meat chickens and turkeys has helped a lot, but I still struggle with those long term laying chickens. Thanks for making a great, simple point!

 

[Bogtown Chick]

This is the transition I've been making. In the past, every animal I've had has been a pet, so it's just natural that I try to make chickens my pets, too. It's a definite shift in thinking now that I'm trying the "farming" thing. Raising meat chickens and turkeys has helped a lot, but I still struggle with those long term laying chickens. Thanks for making a great, simple point!

I balance at the Pet/Farm animal frame of mind, too with my layers and Roo. With kids involved it's hard not to go the pet route. Although, I've noted them toughening up after dispatching a couple extra roos and I think they understand that it's not always easy with these chickens and indeed they are a food source. I won't be the Mom that lies about where Chicken Nuggets come from. LOL. These are tough experiences if your not "used" to it, but it's life.

 

[Sydney Acres]

Quote:
My problem isn't with the kids, it's with my husband! He didn't want to get involved with the turkeys or chickens because he knew that some would be slaughtered -- so I did have fair warning. But one night the turkey poults were about 4 weeks old and went into a night fright, and there were too many of them for me to get them calmed down by myself (7 poults and 7 chicks brooding together). They were running into the sides and flying into the top of the brooder with such a panic that I was afraid they were going to injure themselves, and as soon as a few would calm down others would run into them and it was an ever-worsening swirling episode of hysteria. After about 15 minutes I realized that I wasn't going to get this under control by myself and woke up DH for help. He sat in a chair in the brooder room and I put poult after poult on his lap and shoulders and they cuddled and calmed down. Eventually everyone was fast asleep -- chicks and poults on his lap, and two poults on each shoulder, four little heads dangling on the ends of flaccid necks limply draped in parallel down DH's chest.. Cutest picture ever!!! Let everyone sleep for about 20 minutes, then picked the sleeping babies up and put them back in the brooder.

That was 7 months ago. Ever since then he's bonded to them, and they're bonded to him. Two of the turkey hens are "daddy's girls" in a big way. He leaves for work before sunrise, but in the afternoon they hear his car drive up and are inconsolable until he comes out to the yard to love on them. They like me and are great pets, but I'm not "him." Luckily, both of those girls are keepers. He is also highly bonded to two of the Speckled Sussex roosters, Simon and Garfunkel. Simon is an excellent quality bird -- Garfunkel not so much.

I love having chickens and turkeys as pets, but you can't keep them all. It creates social problems for the ones you do keep, and it prevents you from breeding your good quality stock because you run out of room. So 2-3 of the turkeys and 3 of the roosters need to go to the freezer, and Garfunkel is one of them. Whenever I bring it up DH looks so sad, and says something like, "Please don't ask me to choose between Simon and Garfunkel," and I swear sometimes tears start to well up. Luckily, Garfunkel is a brat and sometimes picks on DH's favorite turkey hen. The other day I heard DH talking to Garfunkel, telling him that he had to stop picking on Isabella because "I'm the only thing keeping you out of the freezer." YESSSSSS!! Maybe soon Garfunkel, Bob, and NotBob will be in the freezer. Then I'll just need to work on getting Stanford and Camilla to join them.

 

[enola]

.....Simon & Garfunkle......
.....Bob and Not Bob......

I love it!

One year the kids named our pigs after our dentists.....
The next year the names were Ham and Roast....

 

[mrballance]

.....Simon & Garfunkle......
.....Bob and Not Bob......

I love it!

One year the kids named our pigs after our dentists.....
The next year the names were Ham and Roast....

That's the down fall naming them is not an option.

 

[Beekissed]

I feel it's good for food to have a face and a name...makes one appreciate the food so much more when it's attached to a personality.