If I got this right.

[JULIE L CORWIN]

We are having built a 10 by 12 chicken coop. With same size run for 16 chickens. Ordered chickens a week ago. Will pick up July 24th. I have a large brooder to handle them. When I get ready to move them into the coop. I'm thinking of insulating it and with plenty of windows for ventilation.
Now my question on flocks of chickens.We live in Ohio and winters at least for a week in winter can get below freezing. With brutal wind chills. I am going to have all egg layers. RIR AND BARRED ROCKS. I'm worried about the eggs freezing before I get to them. I have read on several post for a chicken to lay it need light not heat. I have read it takes 14 to 16 hours to make an egg. Which is it? I'm confused. I'm thinking of using a flat type wall heater with a thermostat and setting it so it's 35 to 40 degrees. So the eggs won't freeze or insulating thier nest somehow to keep the eggs so not to freeze. So how do you insulate a nest to keep the eggs warm without using insulation. Which I don't want to use.Any ideas?Winters do not have long hours of light in Ohio. So supplemental lighting will be needed with a timer.I have always used heat lamps. Not going to this time. Is it true a red bulb calms the bird. What are your feelings on this. How many hours of rest does a chicken need at night?.
I'm trying something new this time.
Last time I ran 2 heat lamps with a 250 bulb in each It stayed 70's all winter inside my coop. Chickens went out rarely in winter. My coop had 35 square foot of floor space and I started out with 8 chickens. Now down to 4. Several broke there necks flying in a small space and must of hit there necks and broke ithem. Feather picking is a big issue with my old flock now. They are 4 years old and will be gone soon before the new ones arrive. My old coop will be for supplies for the new chickens.

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

I never heat my coop, or sheds, I don't recommend it. We get much colder here in Wisconsin. Heat and extra lighting can mess them up. They may lay more during that time but may molt out of season or stop laying if incorrectly given extra light. Extra heat can make them susceptible to illness and chilling because they haven't properly acclimated to winter and thickened their feathers to deal with the lower temperatures.

I collect eggs a few times a day and most days the eggs aren't frozen. Hens will lay at a decreased rate during winter, and if there are big drops in temperatures hens will stop laying for a few weeks.

What are you feeding your older hens? Feather picking is generally a sign of a protein deficiency or from crowding. I recommend feeding a higher protein ration than layer, something like an all flock or non medicated grower with oyster shells on the side.

 

[Mrs. K]

We are cold too, many days below freezing. I too, do not add heat, insulation or light. My hens are protected from the wind and the coop is dry and well ventilated.

As for frozen eggs, occasionally I will get a few. If the hen lays shortly after I have done morning chores, or I get home late. I just keep my eggs in the door bins of my fridge, one is for frozen eggs, there might be a slight crack, but I just put it in the fridge and use those eggs for baking, trying to keep up so that they get used up quickly. The unfrozen eggs are for cooking. Works for me.

The space will help with your ventilation, an opening at the top, is what I would go with. I also pile up mini haystacks in the run, and after a snow, flip the hay on top of the snow, encourages the girls to get out. I do have a shelter in the run, facing south, where the girls can get out of the wind and sit in the sun, and they love that all winter.

Mrs K

 

[azygous]

Insulating your coop would be good, but heating it isn't necessary, especially with dangerous heat lamps. I have severe cold weather from time to time, and I do use an electric oil-filled heater in each coop to keep it just above freezing, more for my convenience in cleaning than for the chickens' comfort. But I only use them when the temperature is due to dive down into the single digits.

Egg laying, after hens reach two and three years old, can all but stop during the shortest days of winter as layers generally require a bare minimum of twelve hours of light per day. Thirteen and fourteen hours would be a luxury, but I keep my artificial light at just twelve and it gets the job done.

I hold off on supplemental light until after my girls have all finished molting, as light can interfere with molt. It can take several weeks of added light before you will see the first eggs, though. However, your pullets will be in their first year of laying so you may see them lay right through their first winter with no augmented lighting.

I use rope lights on a timer for the reason they're real space savers and inexpensive. They tuck up against the ceiling out of harms way and there are no bulbs to break.

You might consider enclosing your run. I have a covered run which gets enclosed with plastic panels during the winter. This makes for contented chickens and they get to have exposure to sunlight all winter even in the coldest weather. It's also a blessing not to have to shovel snow out of the run.

There are many things that contribute to feather picking, protein deficiency being just one. Space shortage, boredom, and individual compulsive behavior are other contributing factors. Pinless peepers can often curb this behavior in many cases, but not all.

A flock block and things to nibble on such as cabbages and carrots can help in some cases.

 

[Cacique500]

Just wanted to throw in there that you may want to increase the size of your run. Rule of thumb is 10 sq ft. per chicken in the run and you've got 120 sq ft. with 16 chickens, or 7.5 sq. ft.

I'll also throw this out (while ducking...and flame suit on) You may want to look at reviews of the chicken breeds...the RIR's can be VERY aggressive to the rest of the flock...YMMV. I've got a NHR, and while she's a beautiful and friendly chicken to me, she's an absolute b*tch to the rest of the flock. She's #2 in the pecking order but if anybody gets within 3 feet of her she'll go after them. My neighbor has 8 RIR and they're pretty aggressive as well...killed one of their own (kept her from food/water) and would chase her relentlessly if she came down off the roost. She eventually died from it.

 

[Mattemma]

I just have a junky metal shed.Chickens did fine without insulation.I built an awning covered with a trampoline mat,and used tarps to block winds.They spent winters on their porch scratching in straw.

I had a brooder lamp clipped to a hole I cut in upper side wall. Just put a 25 watt in it. I used it 2 yrs ago just to light up the shed. This yr. no light. Still got eggs. I do recall a few frozen eggs,but most days they were fine.

Build something now for the winter.Secure posts and a roof that can handle snow,ice,water.Mine was junk. I have to rebuild but it held for the winter. Chickens loved the straw and shredded veggie mixes.

I think I have a RIR. She is a broody right now and I call her Vi short for vicious,lol. She is very protective of her eggs. I have a mix of 14 hens from family farm and home.My only issue is the buffs fly over my 4 foot fence to roam restricted garden spots. I have 3 and every day I am chasing them.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Lets try to clear up a few things. It takes about 25 hours for an egg to go through the hen's internal egg making factory, not 14 to 16 hours. That's from the time the yolk is released until the egg is laid. Some take longer, some less, but 25 hours is a good average, which means each egg is laid a bit later each day for most hens. I've had a very few where that wasn't true, but the vast majority get a bit later each day.

There are different signals that tell the hen to release a yolk to start that process. One is when an egg is laid, another is light. If it is too late in the day they won't start making a new egg because they don't want to lay it in the dark. They skip a day and start the process over the following morning. Of course not every hen lays every day anyway, some regularly skip a day so there is some variation in this.

The length of day isn't all that important. It has a part to play but the really important thing is the days getting longer or shorter. When they days get shorter in the fall hens normally molt and quit laying. Then when the days get longer in the spring they start laying again. That way they were not trying to raise a bunch of chicks when food was really scarce in winter. At least that was the way it was before we domesticated them.

They still follow that general pattern but a lot don't wait until the days get longer to start laying after the molt. They've been bred that way plus we normally don't cut back on their food in winter. They are still eating really well. Sometimes pullets will skip the molt their first winter and continue laying all through their first winter, sometimes not. My older hens always molt but most start laying whenever they are over the molt, whether the days are getting longer or not. Some hens do wait until the days get longer to start back laying and in severe weather they do cut production, but some soldier through. I notice a drop in production when days get really cold.

My shortest days in December are usually around 10 hours, not 14 or 16, and mine still lay pretty well when they start back up. To me that's pretty good proof they don't have to have 12, 14, or 16 hours of light each day to lay. If you are using lights to extend the day you may need 14 or 16 hours, depending on how far you are away from the equator to keep the days form getting shorter, that's where the 14 to 16 comes from.

Chickens do need some dark downtime, but I don't know what the minimum is. Chickens in Alaska on natural light don't get much in winter. In Ohio look at the length of nights in summer and use that as a guide to set your light/dark schedule. Remember it's the days getting shorter that triggers a molt. If you stop artificial light and make the days shorter you might see them molt then, even in spring.

I don't have the cold you do, it seldom gets much below zero Fahrenheit here, usually just a handful of nights a year. I'm retired so I can usually collect eggs a few times a day so I seldom get frozen eggs. When you are not there to collect them you can have a problem. Insulating the nests can help, but chickens will eat many types of insulation, you need to cover it so they can't get to it. Heating your entire coop would be very expensive.

Since you have electricity down there you might look into those seed starting heating pads in the nests. Those don't have an automatic shut-off but are made to stay on continuously. I don't use them but hopefully you can get the right size and one that can be set to a really low temperature. I don't know if that will cause the hens to hang out in the nests and poop in there or not, you may find out.

Windows usually are not very good for ventilation in the winter. You still need good ventilation in the winter to get the moisture from their breath and poop out of the coop. Heated water can add moisture too. In winter frostbite is your biggest health risk, not them freezing. Moist air can contribute to frostbite. You don't want a cold wind hitting them on the roost at night, wind chill can mess the up. There are different ways to provide ventilation without a breeze hitting them but one of the easiest is to have openings higher than their heads when they are on the roosts. That way any breezes pass harmlessly overhead.

There is a lot of discussion on the color of lights. Bright lights can cause them to be more active but plenty of people have extremely bright coops with all kinds of windows. Red lights are supposed to be more calming, but probably a more important benefit is that it's harder for them to see blood with a red light. If chickens can see blood they might become cannibals. Plenty of people brood chicks using white incandescent lights in brightly lit rooms in the house without problems, but my brooder in the coop uses red lights.

People can get really hung up on numbers with chickens; hen to rooster ratios, temperatures in the brooder, roost length, and especially room in the coop and /or run. Some of these are nice to haves, but many of us use different numbers and do fine. You can follow the link in my signature if you wish to see what I consider important when determining how much room you need. One of the things is that chickens don't understand the concept of coop space versus run space. They just see it as room no matter where it is. Either it is there or it's not.

With your number of chickens and the size of your coop you are starting off in really good shape, especially considering that it is an all-female flock the same age. If you ever try integrating new chickens that equation changes but you still aren't horrible, especially in warmer weather when you can count on the run. Overcrowding can cause behavioral problems. If you can set up your run so at least part of it stays snow free and they can be protected from a cold wind in winter you have a lot more usable space on those really bad days where they don't leave the coop. Mine go out to the run even in days right at zero Fahrenheit as long as it is not covered with snow and they are not being blasted with a strong cold wind.

That's enough typing his morning. Good luck!