True confessions, jahphotogal, I've only really had chickens for 4 weeks (almost) I've just been planning them for over a year! But I've gleaned wisdom from this forum, from a couple of good chicken references, and some other Fairbanks chickeners more experienced than I.
My 8' by 4' coop is insulated. There is an electrical outlet and a switched light inside the door. In the winter, the shelter and their downy coats will keep them warm, until it gets to 20 below, and then I'll plug in my heat lamp at night for extra warmth, and switch on the 250 watt light during the day. I have a heated waterer that I'll use in the winter when it gets below freezing.
My run is about 12' by 12', with good access underneath the coop itself, so they can get shelter from rain even outside the coop. I have 2x4 welded wire fence; the bottom 12-18 inches is reinforced with hardware cloth (hardly cloth!!!) which is folded out and away from the run and backfilled with dirt, to inhibit digging under the fence. The top is covered with poultry netting, stitched together with plastic ties, to protect from the overhead predators. The only predator left in these parts that can get in would be small weasels, which hopefully the cat, the dogs, the traffic, and the rooster (eventually) can deter, and the bears (I'll just be SOL if they come around.)
As far as extra heat for the chicks at four weeks, when it gets down below 50 degrees, especially if it's breezy, I'm adding a little heat with my heat lamp. right now it's about 48 degrees and overcast, with a little rain, so the heat lamp is on, but it's a good 5 feet above the floor of the coop. At this age, they're pretty well feathered, and they seem quite happy.
I've tried to invite them out into the run, but they're pretty timid still. They were afraid of their first slice of watermelon; they were hilarious trying to sneak up on it. (It's gone now, eaten to the point of harmlessness.) They perch on the sill, and look out in chicken amazement at the big bad world out there. Starting this weekend, when it's sunnier, I'm going to leave the chicken door open during the day (well, part of the day, "day" here lasts from about 3:00am till 11:00pm, so I'll probably open the door at 9am and close up at 5pm, when I'm home)
I will stop adding any heat at all after this weekend, until sometime this winter when it hits the 20 below mark.
The other trick up my sleeve is 2" foam insulation. My eaves are open with hardware cloth screening, and I have a 12" by 4" vent screen at floor level in the man door, and a 10"x10" vent screen in the chicken door. I have various inserts that I can add to the eaves and the floor vents, as few or as many as I need, to fine tune the ventilation vs draft issue.
The breeds I picked are all reputed to be pretty cold hardy, and there are lots of birds up here that winter over, ravens, chickadees, ptarmigans and spruce hens, and even one pair of bald eagles that hang out all winter because of the availability of ducks who winter over on the open stretches of the Chena River. These birds all have no coop, no solicitous owner to provide them feed and water, and they seem to do okay. There was even an escaped ring necked pheasant that was spotted last winter, looking fat and healthy after a week long 40 below zero cold snap.
That, and the fact that I have friends whose poultry seem to do just fine, makes me feel pretty confident that my flock will thrive.
Of course, I had to take up mealworm farming in order to have a winter long (about 7 months of bug free time) supply of live protein for them. I'm starting to feel like a genuine rancher!!
