Frostbite & Coop Ventilation (UT)

[sunmanchicken127]

Hello

Northern UT here. We have been getting as low at 20 degrees at night lately.

I noticed last night there was blood all over my feeders. Upon some investigating, I found my barred rocks both had what looks like frostbite across their combs. They stick their heads through the fence so I am guessing doing that mixed with the frostbite caused them to bleed. They look like they naturally stopped bleeding within a few hours and I am going to grab blu-kote today and apply it. I also am seeing some small specs of black on my Rhode Island Reds' combs.

I have been working on fixing a coop my chickens are in. We have enough space and roosting bars, but I am stuck on what to do next. Here's what I have:

I want to use ventilation to fix the frostbite. I was going to add another hardware cloth slot on the opposite side of the current one that's right above the shingles (picture #1). However, as you can see, this would put a pretty bad draft across their heads. I don't know how to add more ventilation without putting a draft across them. I am willing to use artificial heating as an absolute last resort, but I am hoping there are other ideas here so I don't have to. My entire flock is 2 BR, 3 RIR, 2 EE & 1 Leghorn.

This is also the first winter for all of them minus 1 RIR and the Leghorn. Those two are a few years old but the other 6 are 6 months old.

Thanks for any help / input.

 

[Eggcessive]

That looks to be injury from the wire. Frostbite is not going to occur at 20 degrees. It happens more around zero or below here. Can you post any pictures of the inside of your coop, so that we can see the roost? Is there any way to lower the roost?