How do you heat your coops

[Baby Chick]

I live in CT so we need heat at night in winter for our hens! What we do (since we don't have a heated waterer) is we go to petco & get the 2 biggest heating lamps for lizards. 1 with a normal bulb & the other with a red one, you can buy both there. The normal one we put on a timer & that we use just for extra day light, so they lay longer, and that turns on at around 6am & goes till 7pm. The red one is for heat more & stays on always but we try to point that at the waterer in the coop.

 

[aoxa]

 I live in CT so we need heat at night in winter for our hens! What we do (since we don't have a heated waterer) is we go to petco & get the 2 biggest heating lamps for lizards. 1 with a normal bulb & the other with a red one, you can buy both there. The normal one we put on a timer & that we use just for extra day light, so they lay longer, and that turns on at around 6am & goes till 7pm. The red one is for heat more & stays on always but we try to point that at the waterer in the coop.

Need..? People raise chickens in Alaska without heat. It's a luxury, not really a need.

CT isn't nearly as cold as it is here.

By the way, buying a heated waterer will save you money and safety in the long run instead of the heat lamps.

 

[Gifa]

How do you keep the eggs from freezing if you don't heat?

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what does anyone suggest for keeping the eggs from freezing?


Thanks for any opinions.

Great question for us poultry newbs.

I am not planning to heat either...I am also not planning to provide supplemental light, so I expect fewer eggs in the wintertime anyway and possibly a period with none at all... But there is always that 4-6 week lag behind the shortest day of the year for the coldest days of the year... so surely egg production will begin to pick up again right at the depths of winter temps.

And as much as I'd like to think I'll be catching those eggs before they hit the hay, I doubt I'll be "that" vigilant. That said, my nest boxes are on the south side of the coop and do get the most sun... They are also the least insulated (the rest of the coop is "double walled") so maybe they'll stay warm long enough between coming out of and sat upon in turns by 100 degree chickens and the nest boxes being warmed by the sun...

I mean... chickens and eggs have been tended and collected for centuries... the majority of which did not know the modern luxuries of electric heat and light... So surely there's a low-tech answer (that doesn't involve a barefoot/pregnant woman in the kitchen)

I dunno... over think much, Gifa. Why yes, I think I will.

Awesome.

 

[SleepyOwl]

I am in MN, and I don't plan to heat the coop. It is lightly insulated. I might get something for when it gets colder than say, -20F.. (light bulb, heat panel, ???) just to keep the edge off. We will see how it goes. I also plan on leaving their bigger window open for ventilation all the time.. It does open to the run, and I will have that roofed, and will wrap in in plastic for the winter. I don't plan on wrapping it tightly, but enough to keep the snow and wind off, and maybe a bit of greenhouse effect on sunny days.

 

[bruceha2000]

I haven't read any of the 91 responses... how do I heat my coop?

I live in Phoenix.

(And I have AC in my big coop)

You live in Phoenix, you DON'T heat your coop.

Heck, in Phoenix even mostly hairless creatures (humans) without natural down coats (like chickens have) only need sweaters in the winter.

 

[Me & Jack]

Probably been said already, but we use the deep litter method, which produces heat on its own as it decomposes. However, on sub-freezing nights I will sometimes put a 75 watt buld over the roosts to be sure.

 

[bruceha2000]

I need to come up with something regarding the eggs as well. I wonder if there is a way to have a huge communal nesting box with a heating pad or something.

I'm sure a heating pad would work but thinking about it I wonder if the chickens would just hang out and sleep in the warm nest box - the LAST place we want them except when they are doing their egg laying business. Just because they don't NEED heat, doesn't mean they won't use the warmest part of the coop.

I'm making my community nest box 4' wide because that is the spacing between the posts on the coop

. The only difference with what I plan vs a 4' long unit with 3 dividers (4 nests) is it will have no dividers and there will be only 1 hole in the center. They can go left or right and nest in the ends where it is darker. At least I THINK that is where *I* would nest if I were a chicken based on what I've read. I saw a post in another forum that said this is sufficient for 50 chickens and I have only 12! If there are problems with them not wanting to share, I can always add a divider or two and a hole or two.

Never having had chickens before, I don't know how much time they spend in the nest laying. Would there perhaps be enough "residual" heat to keep the eggs from freezing for a few hours if the box is insulated? Hopefully the single hole will mean more heat stays in, especially in the ends, compared to 4 nests each with a door almost (if not) the same height and width as the nest box.

Or maybe we can assign laying times so there is a warm hen on the nests almost all day

"Laura, I don't CARE if you aren't going to lay an egg today, you are supposed to be on the left nest from 8:15 to 9:00 every morning!"

 

[WayTooNorth]

Prior to my grandma passing I asked her how they kept chickens warm here in Northern WI in the winter. The chickens generally lived in the barn with the cows but a seperate pen or in a seperate log building. Note, the old log buildings, just due to their thickness, ARE insulated and cow barns (log also) are kept warm by cows body heat.
They would let the chickens out in the yard on the nicer days but the chickens were smart enough to stay inside in bitter cold/snow.
We have an insulated coop that is also ventilated. My ventilation is mostly at one end so when I do add heat I put up a partial wall to slow the added heat loss. We keep a thermometer in the coop to keep an eye on the temp, watch the weather and use timers to turn on/off our heat source. Its mainly at night when the temp really plunges but we do have stretches where it can be well below zero for weeks--even during the day. You so have to suppliment then.
We also keep our water off the floor and on small shelves behind our roosts-heat rises thus less frozen water.
Last year we added the Thermo-Cube to turn on the heat--it was ok but we mainly found it useful if we were going to be gone longer than normal.
Insulating your coop is also a boon for the hot summer months--if its well ventilated and insulated it stays comfortable most of the year.

 

[Snozzle]

I have been wondering about adding some heat to my grower pen myself since the temperatures are unseasonably cold(in the 40's on some nights now, which usually doesn't happen until November or so here) already and my birds aren't old enough to handle much cooler weather yet and I will also be keeping a few seramas this winter and since I probably won't have the room for many cages inside they will go outside too and will get a heater for sure.
For the smallest chickies I just stuck a Brinsea EcoGlow in their house. They use radiant heating plates, but are never hot to the touch, so I really feel safe using them outside too rather then a heat lamp.
As far as insulating the coops go I had a great idea today, if you only have a couple small birds to keep warm just get a larger heavy duty styrofoam cooler from a restaurant supply and cut a doorway in it, those should fit in even the smaller coops. For people with larger groups of birds you can use RV foam insulation sheets, most building material places keep similar stuff, just make sure it's not toxic.
The simplest way, which I just did with my temporary little chicken house while remodeling one of the coops, was that I wrapped a tarp around it(the house is pretty small) and stuffed some hay into the tarp.
Not sure if my ideas will work well, but they are pretty low cost and in theory should work.

 

[smedly9921]

Well I never thought that there would be so much back and forth discussion about heating a chicken coop. I personally have a small radiant electric heater in my coop with a thermastat that keeps the temp just above freezing so that the chickens have water to drink. I am a firefighter and i hate heaters, but you can touch this heater while it is on and it wont burn you. Trust me its not to heat the coop just keep the water from freezing after that there is no further heating done. I do have insulated walls but that is to keep the cool wind out. there is plenty of ventilation for the chickens. I cant wait to see what kinda debate this post starts.