How cold is too cold?

[achickenhead]

Hi - I am going to first apologize for highjacking your thread ...but I have a few questions about "how cold is cold" too

We live in Northern Ontario (about four hours north of Duluth) and we woke up to over an inch of snow this morning and have had frost for about three days ago. Lovely! Oh and of course it is a long weekend and Thanksgiving for us.

It is -3 (27F) right now.

We built our coop with winter in mind. It will often be > -20C (-4F) and with the wind chill it can even reach >-35C (-31F).

It is about 6'x7' and we used vapour barrier/insulation/plywood. The roof is also insulated. We have one window facing south - that doesn't open. We have two round vents at the north side of the upper wall for ventilation. We used a wood door and screen door for vent in the summer. They have a little door we slide closed each night to keep them safe.

So what do we need for the girls? Good ventilation and a heat lamp - anything else? What should the temp be inside the coop? We are getting a heated waterer too.

Our run is only metal wire fence on the ground. Can they go outside in the cold? Do they need to go outside (Sorry - may be a totally stupid question but this is our first flock)? If so, what temps are safe?

Any and all advice is greatly appreciated.

 

[LittleMamaBigPapa]

Quote:
Hello "achickenhead" - I am gonna piggy back on your hijack! Can you post a picture of your coop? We got about 1-2 inches of first snow last night, and my chickens (first timers as well) came out of the coop VERY slowly as they tried to comprehend all the white cold stuff.

They are outside playing, acting like their usual curious chicken selves.

My rooster, we call Beans, after about the first 5 minutes came back in the coop and apparently wanted to warm his toes.......

but he has been outside with the others ever since (going on 3 hours now). We are going to be doing the trial and error just like you. My husband is outside right now drilling a hole in our coop to plug in our heated waterer. I believe it will put off a little heat for them. My main goal right now is to protect them from wind, that stinking wind can get sooooo cold!!! Best to you and your chickens. Please post pictures!!!!

 

[CityChook]

Yes, the snow this morning was a bit surprising, wasn't it.

Spend some time searching on coop design for winter, ventilation, heat, etc. In the blue bar up above. There is a TON of information available.

Your coop sounds a lot like mine. Sounds like your bases are pretty well covered.

Some don't use heat, but I do. The difference it makes in my electricity bill vs. the amount of sleep I'd lose worrying about it is worth it. It's not bad.

I use a ceramic heat emitter over the roost - gives radiant heat with no light. Works for me. I have found that the red light heats the air temperatures in the coop more, but tends to make the girls a little aggressive with each other. And seems to keep them up at night. But I know that it works for others.

Invest in a heated dog water bowl. Worth every penny. Mine cost $25.

Hope this helps. Feel free to PM me if I can help you in any way.

 

[patandchickens]

Hi there, I'm about an hour N of Toronto, so some hours E of you

Quote:
You will want a lot more ventilation than that (and you won't want it on the north wall)... see my ventilation page (link in .sig below) for some suggestions on what works well for northern winters.

What should the temp be inside the coop?

It is not a big deal as long as you have GOOD VENTILATION (ie. the coop air is dry, not humid) and sensibly-chosen breeds. Your chickens will probably be *fine* down towards -20C, and quite possibly below that (though it is not a bad idea to have electricity available in case you do decide to run a lamp over the roost in a cold snap or if you detect problems). Actually the other two pages in my .sig below may be of interest to you too

Our run is only metal wire fence on the ground. Can they go outside in the cold? Do they need to go outside (Sorry - may be a totally stupid question but this is our first flock)?

Unless you have a rreeeeeeaaaally big coop with few chickens in it, you are likely to run into grumpy cannibalistic chickens if you try to keep them locked inside much if at all. Sure, open the popdoor and if they want to go out, they will, if they don't, they won't

If you have bare frozen ground or bare ice, it is good to toss down some straw or hay or something to spare their feet; snow is not so cold for them to walk on. Some chickens go outdoors more in the winter than others. You can increase the outdoorsiness of your flock by sheltering the run as much as possible from the wind.

Good luck, have fun,

Pat​

 

[gottalovemychickens]

Quote:
Im out about 50miles south east of denver CO and the day before yesterday we had a 72* high , and yesterdays high was only 33* and last nights low was 5* with a -4* wind chill . all of my chickens made it thru with now frostbite or anything . so if that tells you anything lol .

My friends dad has had chickens make it thru -20* temps with ease

 

[WisconsinGardenChick]

Quote:
You will want a lot more ventilation than that (and you won't want it on the north wall)... see my ventilation page (link in .sig below) for some suggestions on what works well for northern winters.

Pat,

I have read your ventilation and cold weather pages, but I'm still unclear just how much ventilation I should have in my coop. It might be helpful to give sizes, such as for an x by y coop, z square feet of ventilation.

Alternatively, do you think you could give a few examples? Our coop is small - only 3' x 4' - inside a pen. We have 4 chickens (2 BRs and 2 RIRs). (Photo below.)

[/img]

We are some of those who fell for the "in a cold climate you need a small coop so the chickens' body heat can keep it warm" myth. That's what everyone around here says, and we bought plans designed by a person from this area thinking we'd done the right thing. In his original design, the coop is only 2' x 4'.

Gradually over the summer we independently realized what you say in your cold weather page - that a larger coop is better in cold climates b/c the chickens are likely to spend more time indoors. But the coop was already built, so the best we could do at this point was to expand it by a foot. We also put a nest box hanging on the outside wall (not shown in this older photo - but where you see the egg door) to increase floor space.

It has two ventilation holes 3" in diameter in the top of the roost box. It also has two windows, but they don't open. The largest is on the south side of the coop. We deliberately placed it there for winter sun. The deciduous trees in our neighbor's yard shade that south side in summer.

During the summer, we left the pop door open day and night for ventilation, and to let the birds come and go as they please, since the pen is quite secure. The chickens never went in the coop except to sleep.

We're putting a new front on the coop, and plan to put a window there that can open. We have also insulated the coop.

My questions are:
1) Do you think we have adequate ventilation (3' x 4' coop with two round ceiling holes 3" in diameter)? We will leave the pop door open during the day in winter (it's always open in summer).

2) Do you think we will need to heat the coop in winter because it is too small?

Thanks in advance for any advice you can offer.

Katherine

 

[patandchickens]

Quote:
The thing is, it depends very much on your exact coop design and how many chickens are in it and so forth. Too many variables.

The most I am willing to say is that, with the exception of people in real hot-summer places who will need more, if you have 1 sq ft of ventilation per chicken you are real likely to be ok (assuming some or much of it is located to be useable in wintertime); or 1 sq ft of ventilation per 10 sq ft of floor area for a less-generous rule of thumb or for sparsely populated coops.

That said, not all coops behave according to those rules of thumb -- mine doesn't, actually, largely b/c contains waaaaaaay less chickens than most other peoples' structures. (Doing some quick math, if you include all the airspace in the building, as you should, not just the chicken pens, and if you consider my 2 turkeys to be "worth" 3 chickens apiece, I currently have 20 square feet of building floorspace per chicken...)

Our coop is small - only 3' x 4' - inside a pen. We have 4 chickens (2 BRs and 2 RIRs). (Photo below.)

That top part above the run, is that enclosed like an attic or (I am guessing) it's just solid siding on the top part of the run? And, where are your two existing vent holes located?

Your best bet IMHO would be something like this: wrap most (NOT all!!) of the run in plastic or something else to snow/windproof much of it. (Do not cover all of it, or it will get super humid in there! Leave all or most of one "tall" wall uncovered, preferably the one on the most-usually-downwind side).

Then, put ventilation openings from the coop into the run at the top of the wall that is shared with the run. So your ventilation will open into the *run*. Which you are protecting but carefully *not* making into a humidity chamber

It would not be a bad idea to put a ventilation opening atop one other coop wall as well, whichever side is also usually downwind.

As far as size of ventilation openings, I think that for your size/design of coop and four hens, you want something the length of the wall and maybe 6-12" high depending on how you feel about the tradeoff between potentially having made more vent area than you need vs potentially needing more than you've made. And of course you want to make some means of adjusting how open they are on any given day. Oh, and a droppings board, cleaned every morning, will also help reduce moisture in the coop and thus reduce the need for ventilation.

I think it is quite possible that with adequate ventilation (particularly if it can be done into a nice dry protected run) you may not have to heat the coop. But as you are in Wisconsin, it would not hurt to have electricity available out there (for a heated waterer base or heated waterer, if nothing else! big convenience.) just in case.

To a large degree though your first winter (ANYONE's first winter) will involve a learning curve of finding out how your particular coop, in your particular site, with your particular chickens, and your particular management style, will behave during different weather. Put a max-min thermometer out there and reset it regularly so you can track indoor temperature near the roost; and pay attention to condensate/frost and to the chickens' behavior and combs. And you will gradually figure out, through minor harmless trial and error, what you need to do to keep things running well.

Good luck, have fun,

Pat​

 

[achickenhead]

Patandchickens and CityChook

Thanks for your suggestions and comments! We had a look at your pages also.

I forgot that (in addition to 2-4" round vents at the north side) we also have a rectang. vent (a 1 by 1 vent) on the east side of the building too. The building is about 42 sq. feet and we are only going to have 5 chickens.

Our coop is built into a hill with mature trees and is protected on three sides from winds, etc. We will definately have to work on run for some protection from the wind. Hay is easy to lay down so there feet are protected.

So, I guess we can play it by ear and watch humidity levels, etc. Is there a target humidity? Same as our indoors? Aside from moisture what other signs to we watch for? Huddling and their combs? Do they get white frostbite? Or sag? What happens if they are too cold - not that it will happen.

LittleMamaBigPapa
Yes - they were a bit apprehensive coming out but have been playing outside with no problems. I am going to try to post picts.

They have survived a bear visiting us for five nights in a row too! He even had his muddy paws up on the metal screen door...

Oh and this is the first building we ever built so give us a break

- most of it (aside from the roofing and plywood) was recycled!)

 

[patandchickens]

Quote:
I would still suggest more vents. They will be easier to add now than January

What direction does your people door face - is that south? Could you possibly "unblock" the spaces between the rafters on that side (and cover the spaces with hardwarecloth)? That would help. Or cut a row of narrow long slots, maybe 3-6" high by the length of the space between each pair of studs, across the upper part of that wall? (Again, with hardwarecloth; and for any vent arrangement you want some means of stopping it up partly or totally if the weather requires).

Is there a target humidity? Same as our indoors? Aside from moisture what other signs to we watch for? Huddling and their combs? Do they get white frostbite? Or sag? What happens if they are too cold - not that it will happen.

My cold coop page talks about a bunch of this, but: commercial poultry barns aim for 50% humidity, I don't think it's really crucial for backyarders except to avoid *high* humidity, like 75-80% and higher. Do not trust hygrometers unless you have personally calibrated yours (that is, tested its accuracy and calculated the correction factor), even expensive ones can be significantly "off".

If the comb points start to look pale, purplish, dark red or whitish, that is the onset of frostbite. Another sign of chickens having trouble dealing with extreme cold would be a reluctance to move from where they're huddled (not just 'preferring to sit right here for the moment' but staying in one place all day, sort of thing).

They have survived a bear visiting us for five nights in a row too! He even had his muddy paws up on the metal screen door...

Oooo, that's worrisome. Have you considered putting up a bear-strength electric fence, preferably in a wide perimeter around your yard (right around the coop specifically is better than *nothing*, but the further you can keep a bear from your coop, the less likely he'll be excessively tempted). A bear can rip that coop right apart if he or she wants to, you really cannot build a coop that is bearproof other than to run an electric fence, which if you have bears actively interested in your chickens might be really worthwhile...

Good luck, have fun, btw good job building the coop!

,

Pat​

 

[CityChook]

Quote:
I think that with the 1x1 vent, you're going to be okay.

I don't know what the target humidity would be. Maybe Pat has an idea and will chime in. Once the real cold hits, you can feel if it's humid inside. And it will be stinky if there's not enough ventilation. Poo sort of freezes when it gets super cold, but the ammonia smell will linger if there's not enough ventilation and the humidity is too high. I have seen others write about getting frost inside on the windows - seems like a good sign that there's too much moisture. I didn't have any frostbite problems last year, so can't comment there. Again, doing some searching would probably net you the answers you are seeking.

It's still snowing here today. They're saying 2-3 inches by the end of the day. My guess is that there will be more as it's almost 3 now at my house.

PS - bear visits scare the dickens out of me....