How do you heat your coops

[kyrose]

Ok ,,,what kind of water heaters do you [guys and gals]use???? Getting close to cooler weather and curious!!!Kevin

I use heated dog bowls.They work great.

 

[Minniechickmama]

I live in Minnesota.
It gets cold here.
I do not heat, in fact, I have 4 4-foot by 5-foot windows that are left open all winter long. They are covered in hardware cloth, have an awning over them and face South.

I have Black Minorcas


These pictures were taken on January 5th of this last year. The got minimal frostbite on the very tips of their combs. Their wattles suffered more because they dip them in the water when they drink and they would get frozen on the edges.
I also have Welsummers and you can see where he got more frostbite than did the two Minorcas with the much bigger combs, but still very little.

The key? Keep it dry, keep it clean, keep them fed and have fresh water daily. None of my birds froze to death in this set up.
I have had problems in smaller coops though where I wanted them to be warm. Like has been mentioned, chickens produce a lot of moisture, and mainly comes from their breathing not their poop.
This building has a double wall, (siding on the outside and OSB on the inside). There is no insulation. The doors are on either end so that in the warmer months I get a nice cross breeze through here if I open both ends.
There are some things I would do differently about this set up, but not the windows and not the heat.
I do have 25 watt florescent, screw in lights, one over each of the 9 pens. They are set on a time and are above the pens about 9-feet. The water is in heated water bowls, each only using 25-watts of electric as well. I have to clean them daily, but they work perfectly.
This style of chicken coop has been used for over 100-years. It can be found by looking up "Woods Open Air Chicken Coops" if I am not mistaken. Take advantage of the sun and what natures offers and you.

 

[Fred's Hens]

Minniechickmama, The Half-Monitor or full Monitor style has been in use for 100 years. Like your little red barn-coop, our barn and your newer barn are all based on these century old, well tested designs. We intentionally adapted the Monitor style when we re-built our barn, a few years back, as a dedicated chicken barn.

 

[Kim95037]

I use the flat panel wall heater and it works awesome. I hooked it up to a thermostat so it comes on at whatever I set it to. I like the flat panel heater because its super efficient and safe. I just added another chicken coop and run to my existing coop and run, and I plan on putting on in there as well.

 

[americanvalkyrie]

I live in Minnesota.
It gets cold here.
I do not heat, in fact, I have 4 4-foot by 5-foot windows that are left open all winter long. They are covered in hardware cloth, have an awning over them and face South.

Um... yeah, I'd say that pretty much qualifies you for the "Knows What She's Talking About" category! I do NOT want to move to Minnesota, as beautiful as the pictures are.

 

[lolita117]

No heat, no insulation. My walls actually have cracks in between every board. Here is a pic



Last winter was mild, but I bought a tarp to cover the North and West wall. If ever we anticipate super cool/windy weather I'm prepared to put that up to block the wind. The way my coop is built makes for excellent ventilation, especially in the summer months.

 

[aoxa]

I use the flat panel wall heater and it works awesome. I hooked it up to a thermostat so it comes on at whatever I set it to. I like the flat panel heater because its super efficient and safe. I just added another chicken coop and run to my existing coop and run, and I plan on putting on in there as well.

You need to heat in California?

I've never seen heaters like this. How expensive? I'd like something this small for my bedroom.



Oh and I would love to have a portable heater for the barn when I go out to hang out with my chickens - I like to take pictures of them, and the temperatures really make this not as fun.

We typically stay colder than freezing at all times in the winter (except for last winter - it was very nice and warm right up until mid January). Our temperatures range from -5 to -40 with windchill. They all survived it no problem. Even my fancy breeds (silkies and polish).

 

[aoxa]

No heat, no insulation. My walls actually have cracks in between every board. Here is a pic Last winter was mild, but I bought a tarp to cover the North and West wall. If ever we anticipate super cool/windy weather I'm prepared to put that up to block the wind. The way my coop is built makes for excellent ventilation, especially in the summer months.

My barn is like that as well

This is from the outside. There are heat lamps on because I have chicks under 5 weeks

 

[blueberrychickens]

Ok ,,,what kind of water heaters do you [guys and gals]use???? Getting close to cooler weather and curious!!!Kevin

Cookie tin water heater, works great! I have a one gallon plastic waterer. Never have a problem with frozen h2o, just be sure to keep a spare bulb on hand incase the one in the tin burns out. https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/117287/hats-off-to-inventor-of-cookie-tin-heater-thanks

 

[MaggieO]

We just started raising chickens in our backyard last year, and here in Minnesota the one question non-farmers always ask is, "but how do they stay warm?" I keep wondering whether the prairie ancestors worried as much as we soft suburbanites do about chicken comforts. Perhaps it -is- an important question because backyard chickens don't get the animal warmth of other livestock. But then again, they're the only ones in my household who have down jackets, and they did just fine without heat. They eat more in order to generate heat, and at night they huddle closer on the roost.

We did put a lot of thought into designing, insulating, and ventilating the coop and covered run. We made it a little larger than the minimum 4 sq ft./bird that we kept reading about, and I think that helped prevent any aggressiveness or unhealthy issues related to overcrowding. The coop itself is insulated on all six sides (walls, floor, ceiling), and DH put plexiglass over the windows in order to block the heat transfer. But--and this is very important--the coop wasn't airtight. Following advice we read on this site (Pat, who lives in Canada), we also had vents running along the upper edge of the north and south walls of the coop. We did keep the north vents closed for most of the winter, but the south vents stayed open. As far as the run is concerned, DH put up plastic sheeting to protect them from the wind. I'm not so sure that was necessary, but then again, the chickens didn't lose any of their toes. We do have a light in the coop to encourage egg production, but it's a solar powered LED so it generates no heat. As far as the water was concerned, we just made sure we changed it several times a day.

Maggie