Hello everyone! Brand new chicken momma here! I live in Wickenburg, AZ (about 45 minutes NW of PHX aka HOT HOT HOT in summer). I have spent a lot of time reading on coop designs and such and so much is focused on keeping them safe and warm that when I searched for ventilation articles it dawned on me that we have the opposite problem. Yes where I live does get cold, (even below freezing at night in the winter), while planning a 4 walled structure am I basically making a chicken oven they will cook in come summer? A few things I read stated that solid hardware cloth walls for 1 or more walls isn't a terrible idea. My biggest concern is keeping them safe though. We have a decent sized area to work with but I am not looking to spend a fortune. My biggest predators I am guessing are hawks and coyotes. Our neighbors have hens in a shoddy little area and have no problems so maybe coyotes don't like to jump 6' wire fences? Anyways looking forward to learning and hopefully having a safe set up in about 4 weeks so my babes can move outside!
I'm in a warm part of Tucson, running about 4-5 degrees hotter in the summer and 4-5 degrees colder in the winter than the "official" Tucson temperatures. There is a delicate balance between shade and air flow and predator control. I have a variety of structures and they each have their own positive and negative points. Remember in the summer the sun swings to the northwest by the mid afternoon, which means you need shade on the NORTH side as well as the west from March through September.
My favorite design is my breeding pen/s. That structure is 6' deep x 12' wide, with a slanted rolled roof. I made it 6' deep so I could use 8' plywood for the roof and have it overhang a foot or more on the back. It has almost 7' of height in the front and about 6' height in the back. If I had to do it over again I would figure out how to make it deeper and still keep the overhang, because the sun nearly hits the back wall for a couple of hours each day in the winter. A front "porch" would help a lot. Three sides are enclosed, but there are several inches of ventilation space along the top edge of each of the solid walls, which I screened in with hardware cloth. The front "wall" is entirely hardware cloth, with 80% shadecloth covering most of it. The front faces south. It could use some additional solid sections for deeper shade. There are three separate doors in the front. I can section the structure off into up to three pens during breeding season, or remove section dividers as needed.
My next favorite design is my original coop/run, which is 12' x 14', enclosed on 3 sides, with lots of windows (screened with hardware cloth) under the eaves. There are side wings separating the front run area from the back "coop" area, with about 6' in the middle that is open to the run section. There are roost perches in each side wing. The run is enclosed with hardware cloth. I originally shaded the run part with shadecloth, but I quickly tacked up some plywood over the run for shade because the shadecloth was not sufficient. I just sectioned off one wing of it to use as an outdoor chick brooding area. We will see how that works. So far, so good.
Basically, the birds need sufficient deep shade. They need access to sun as well. They need to be out of major drafts, they need to stay dry, they need lots of water, and they need to be protected from predators. As long as they are dry and shaded they should be fine in the winter.
(I have one "coop" that is simply a 10' x 10' chain link dog kennel with a tarp over it, and a perch. The sides are shaded with a combination of shadecloth, reed fencing, and plywood sections fastened up. It was intended as a temporary overflow space but it has been in continuous use for two years now and the chickens have been fine. I do go through a lot of tarps. It is not the best setup. But it works.)
Predators in my area are usually loose dogs who break into the yard and kill any chickens that happen to be out. I have dealt with that by sectioning the yard into different areas with 2"x4" wire fencing supported on T-posts, so the dogs have to break into several different sections to get to all the birds. Most of my fencing is only 4' high and any determined predator could get in, but it is what I had on hand. If you can go with 6' fencing it would be better. A determined predator is still going to figure out how to get in, no matter what you do. It's like locking your car. Most of the time it works
If the chickens are properly acclimated and can get out of the sun, rain, and wind they will be fine.
Good luck!
