Can insulating your coop be a bad thing?

[CityChook]

Nice response, LynneP. After building our coop, our first, we are STILL learning about what we did right/wrong. And as the season changes from warmth into wind/snow, we continue to learn and adapt. Just this morning when I went to let the girls out, I found my locks frozen solid. My husband had to come out with a torch to open them. Live and learn.

I see you're in IL. I, too, have a small urban flock in the cold midwest. I insulated both the walls and the roof. It wasn't cheap. However, because I don't have tons of birds so their body heat isn't doing much to heat up the coop. They have a southern, large window, which lets in plenty of sun, but even this isn't enough to keep it warm in there. All that said, I am still glad that I insulated. I hate to think of what the interior of the coop would be like without it.

 

[ncCHICKS]

No, i think it's good to insulate your coop. It's just like insolating your house. Keeps in cool in summer and keeps out cold in winter. Don't ask me how!

 

[patandchickens]

Quote:
Assuming the ceiling was insulated too and metal roofing nails were not piercing the insulation or any exposed wood up there (as I've seen a lot of times in horse barns - boy will THAT drip!), then I think we may just have a different idea of what constitutes "good ventilation".

I have worked in LOTS of horse barns etcetera, and I just have to say that what you describe is completely nothing I've ever seen, and furthermore is contrary to the general accepted principles of constructing buildings for livestock. Which is different in some regards than constructing houses.

Honestly I think it comes down to what you're considering well-ventilated versus what's actually well-ventilated from a livestock housing perspective.

(e.t.a. -- oh wait. Maybe I do know what you're talking about... like when you go into certain (unheated) buildings on a warm damp day after a spell of cold weather, like the first really beautiful pre-Spring day, and it is all condensate-y inside? If that's what you're tlaking about, it is really a thermal mass issue more than an insulation issue.

Indeed my (uninsulated and uninhabited) horse barn does this (quite badly sometimes). Its poured slab and 12-16" timbers are just serious heat sinks, by virtue of what they're made of, and when they're cold they warm up only sloooowwwly over the course of several months, so when a humid warm-March-day breeze blows (or seeps) in, the moisture condenses out. It really is the thermal mass of the walls, floors, whatever that does this, though. And actually insulation, by preventing the building from getting *as* cold in wintertime, reduces the extent to which this happens. (If I could magically and very thoroughly insulate my barn floor and its heavy timbers, my condensation problem would go away. Which would be nice, as it's where I store my horse hay. Unfortunately of course that is not feasible, so I have to rely on a) shut the barn on warm spring days, b) ventilate the heck out of it on cold windy (dry) spring days, and c) count on the grass startin' growing before the last bits of the year's hay starts to mold

)

Does any of that sound more like what you're describing?)


Pat (btw a "she" not a "he", not that it really matters for the purposes of this discussion

)

 

[spook]

I just had a conversation about over insulating your houses. Also, they can get used to it, but you are more likely to have mold spores, breed infections and illness. Not only that, but mites hide in that insulation and it makes it terrible to treat, ie, never ending.
Living here in Maine, had never thought of letting the girls out to play in the snow and sunshine, but these guys with premo stock actually do this to keep them healthy. One told me about housing his silkies in a 3 sided building due to no time to build the new coop, needless to say, they were the healthiest birds at the spring show!
My 20 year old unused coop has cracks between the boards that I'd place plastic within 3 inches to the eves. The roof was wood rafters and aluminum roofing. No insulation other then the snow, the water froze, just like it does in the new house, but it seems mean, but its really a blessing in disguise.

Good luck in your delima!
ps-I had never lost a hen in all those years to cold.

 

[All about the EGG]

I was thinking about putting 1/2 inch polyfoam on the sides the roost attaches to. Mainly because I see the hens bunched up on the wall. And I dont want one of them sticking to it when its -20 out!

 

[chickenpiedpiper]

Wow, lot of opinions on this topic. We live in central New Hampshire and have fully insulated and heated coop. I installed a panel heater from shop the coop.com last fall, with a regulater that turns it on at 35* and off at 45*. I have a red heat light bulb that turns on automatically at dark, and off at dawn, with the sensor sitting in the one window. I personally insulated the sides and ceiling of our coop. I did all of this with less than 200.00 and an unused side of an old shed. I attatched a fully covered outdoor run and leave the little chicken door unblocked, so the ladies can come and go at will.

Ventilation is provided by this same little door, and a people sized door at the other end that has cracks all around it, and the single window. During the day I open wide the big door to air every thing, and let the sun in. Yes the chicken smell is sometimes strong in the morning, but mostly when it is rainy or snowy out and the ladies dont want to be out in it!

For 2 bitter cold and very snowy winters, this coop has kept my ladies comfy and safe. I dont worry about predators, or chills. I have never had condensation issues, (I think the redlight helps counter act that dampness) and my electric bill doesnt even register an increase! I have a thermometer in there, and it is always comfortably above freezing. Yes, my ladies are spoiled but I would have it no other way. The thought of making any animal not designed by mother nature to survive it, sit thru a new england winter with out adequate consideration of thier needs is just not the way I was raised. Frost bite HURTS like hell! and just because we dont feel it, and our little friends dont complain about it makes us tend to shrug it off. Not in my yard thank you very much!

I am not saying that you have to go to any extremes, but if you cant insulate as well as you might for your own children, at least put in a $15.00 red bulb heat lamp that will keep them safe from the worst pre dawn chills. Aim it intelligently and from a safe distance, and keep a back up bulb some where safe, they burn out suddenly, and when you most need them!

Good Luck!
here is an image of our three young polish going to roost up high on the perches made for the Lil birds in our flock.... The larger birds prefer the lower and wider shelves.

 

[Zookeeper9000]

Well I feel better with my decission to insulate. The old timers around here have been really on me about this. I have a open lean too. It is 16 x 7 and I will be putting up walls with outside panels on first and then putting the pink sheet insulation on that. Next year I will add another layer of the paneling. I will have a door and windows on the south side. I will have the red heat lamps for each of the 2 pens. I already have the florecent lights to put over each pen.

For ventilation at the top of the lean too near the roof there is a 1/2 inch gap that goes all around the roof. I was going to seal that but from what I am reading I should leave that gap for ventelation. Is that right.


Thanks. I plan on telling those old farts to leave their nose out of my coop. But in a nicer way LOL.

 

[patandchickens]

Quote:
Depending what you mean by 'chicken smell'.... if your nose can smell ammonia, then the concentration of ammonia is high enough it's damaging the chickens' respiratory system, i.e. too high for health. (If you just mean the non-ammonia type 'animals live here' scent, that is different)

The thought of making any animal not designed by mother nature to survive it, sit thru a new england winter with out adequate consideration of thier needs is just not the way I was raised.

Although, plenty of people get chickens through winters much colder than yours without frostbite and without a heat lamp. Sometimes without insulation, too, depending. Of course breed matters, also air quality. But I'm not sure it's accurate to say 'not designed by mother nature to survive it', since typically they DO and quite well too.


Pat​

 

[Chirpy]

Pat (btw a "she" not a "he", not that it really matters for the purposes of this discussion wink)

Although I'm going to stay out of the 'meat' of this thread as I'm too tired to think things through right now I did want to apologize to Pat. Sorry I made the wrong assumption.

It's always nice knowing which gender we're chatting with.

 

[All about the EGG]

Quote:
I guess I should reword this...they are not bunched on the wall, one is sitting next to the wall, and touching it. I would not want them to stick to it!