Humidity-sometimes ya just can't beat it.

[aart]

Sorry for your loss, aart. We had weather in the low 60s today, crazy. Just about all the snow is gone, and what is left is evaporating into fog more than melting.

Hope you got your feed to the coop without falling! You should check out YakTrax, they go on your shoes to give extra traction on ice.

Thanks.
Got the feed moved pretty easy, transferred to buckets in garage then used horizontal mode hand truck to move buckets to coop and dumped into feed can....hand truck acted as a 'walker' for this gimp haha!
I usually use the hand truck vertical mode to get bag out to coop and up a temp ramp on stairs, so just an iteration to accommodate wanked knee and ice.
That hand truck is one of the best tools I've ever purchased.

YakTrax would be great on ice and snow but rough on other floors I have to traverse on same trips.

 

[NNYchick]

We got rid of all the snow yesterday it was 60 degrees out. Then this morning we woke up to a good 12+” and still coming down, temperature is 10 degrees and falling. Grr, my first winter with chickens is not giving me a break.
I cleaned out all the wet straw and put down pine flakes. Only to go in and find the wind blew in snow but luckily it’s only the dust bath area, everywhere else has plastic up.
I took a small section of fleece and put it up loose over part the window to let air flow but hopefully block any more snow.

At tractor supply the girl said with temperature like these she pulls out the pellets and feeds strictly crack corn as it increases their body temp. I have heard that corn does then I heard it doesn’t. Do any of you do this? I did buy a bag of crack corn but I gave it to them with their pellets.

 

[BantyChooks]

At tractor supply the girl said with temperature like these she pulls out the pellets and feeds strictly crack corn as it increases their body temp. I have heard that corn does then I heard it doesn’t. Do any of you do this? I did buy a bag of crack corn but I gave it to them with their pellets.

I feed a few scoops as a supplement, but I definitely wouldn't pull pellets. Some say it's not helpful, but it keeps my chooks active and eating when they'd otherwise sit on the roost all day and lose condition.

 

[NNYchick]

I have been giving them some scratch that had cracked corn in it but she said the cracked corn was better.

 

[aart]

At tractor supply the girl said with temperature like these she pulls out the pellets and feeds strictly crack corn as it increases their body temp.

Wives tale. BS.
Any digestion will create heat.....pulling pellets to feed only corn is only going to reduce their nutrition. Bad Idea.

 

[aart]

Colder today but humidity down in the 60's.
Bedding still damp and semi-frozen in places so broke it up some,
it'll all even out eventually.

 

[lazy gardener]

With the thaw and heavy rains yesterday, the coop turned into a sponge. The moisture in the air was palpable. Raining until noon today, followed by continued mixed precipitation, with temp dropping down to 2* overnight. Negative digits tomorrow night. This weather pattern will create the greatest frost bite risk yet for the season.

 

[lazy gardener]

At tractor supply the girl said with temperature like these she pulls out the pellets and feeds strictly crack corn as it increases their body temp.

Wives tale. BS.
Any digestion will create heat.....pulling pellets to feed only corn is only going to reduce their nutrition. Bad Idea.

Totally agreed.


I bought 2 bags of 18% multi flock to improve their winter nutrition.

 

[KristinS]

aart, I am so sorry to hear about your loss and the moisture situation. I think I am past what you are going through now (at least temporarily). We did not have 3FT of snow, but when the snow started melting, and the rain came in and helped it melt faster, is also when I had the one rooster with frostbite. So, it seems that when the humidity is so high, there is just no way to prevent the frostbite without bringing them inside or heating their coop.
Your coop is awesome by the way.
I have also been giving my chickens a good 18% feed, layer crumble, and scratch to keep them going. They have been so happy this week because they have been have been able to go outside and peck around. My chickens do not like snow, except to eat.

 

[NNYchick]

Ok that’s what I thought. I feed Flock Balancer 20% Booster in one feeder and I just add layer crumble in another because some of them won’t eat the pellets unless I wet them down and they don’t stayed thawed. I have oysters shells out and they get a couple handfuls if scratch in the evening. Once a week I give scrambled eggs and one a week I add poultry conditioner pellets for extra protein. I haven’t recently but I usually rotate evening scratch with sprouted BOSS, wheat berries, mung beans mix.