My small shoddy little coop~ventilation position question. PHOTOS!

[KatyTheChickenLady]

and your coop is in no way shabby! It looks great. Just one more note we use straw bales around our dog house in the winter . . . it keeps it so cozy the kids even crawls in. It's a mess to clean up come summer but it really works great.

 

[patandchickens]

If you are going to have vents on opposite walls, and live somewhere that gets real winter, you'd better be sure you have ENOUGH on JUST the downwind wall to get by with the upwind one shut, which is how you'll spend most of the winter.

If you're only going to have vents on 2 walls, adjacent walls are probably best. I'm talking cold-weather ventilation here -- in hot weather, what matters is not so much where they're located (although open to the prevailing breeze helps) as just having *a lot*.

Hatrick, I can suggest a two options to consider:

- you could add another vent on the E side to make sure you have enough, or possibly on the E end of the S side of the coop. BTW, although your vent is not overly large (possibly ok for just 3 chickens tho) that is a great hood for it, what is that, a dryer vent hood?

- you could cover and plasticwrap the run, except for the E-facing part that's not against the coop and possibly also excepting the S side facing the fence. This will go a long ways towards keeping the wind from whooshing directly in thru the popdoor during the day. The popdoor will be closed at night, so cross-drafts should not be an issue then.

This is not either/or; you could certainly do both.

Don't put a vent on the N side when you live in the N, you will not be able to use it most of the winter

lamelde, you will certainly be in good shape if you provide 1 sq ft of total vent space per chicken, or 1 sq ft per 10 sq ft of floorspace in the coop. A number of coops can get away with less, but not all, so the most guaranteed thing is to just build *lots* of adjustable/closeable ventilation and then you will be pretty sure to have enough no matter what

Good luck, have fun,

Pat

 

[Hatrick]

"If you are going to have vents on opposite walls, and live somewhere that gets real winter, you'd better be sure you have ENOUGH on JUST the downwind wall to get by with the upwind one shut, which is how you'll spend most of the winter."

OK, um, what?

And our door is just a hole cut out of the coop, you mean we have to figure out how to close it? Should we just make a door for it that we close at night?

So you're saying I could add another vent on the same wall where the vent already is? Is this alright, that's above the nest boxes...
or you're saying I can add one on the back wall near the east end of it right? I'm just clarifying. Or were you saying I should block off the East facing vent?

As for what kind of vent it is, I have no idea, my husband got it at Home Depot. Probably a dryer vent though.

And yes we're going to stack bales on the North side of the coop, which will block our access doors but slugging hay makes me feel like a real farmer.

I must say I've had A LOT of pets in my life and these girls have had a pretty steep learning curve, worth every minute though.​

 

[Chickenmaven]

Your coop is alot like my friend's - very simple. I would recomment keeping it simple and not going to great shakes to move vents & such. There's such a thing as overthinking these things - they are "just" chickens. You have a vent, right? That means moisture will escape. My friend moves her little coop right up next to her house, so that the strong wind is blocked by the house and a fence. She stacks straw around the coop & its little run. Voila!
Another thought I had was putting the coop in a dog kennel and tarping the entire kennel. Chickens do great in the cold. They just need their environment dry.

 

[patandchickens]

Quote:
OK, um, what?

If you have cross ventilation, you will have a crossWIND in winter, and (especially in such a small coop) you do not want that. It will freeze your chickens' combs. In the wintertime you want your vents to minimize drafts, not create them

When it is windy in the winter, you will want to shut the upwind vents (also keeps undue amounts of blowing snow out of the coop) and there will be times, possibly a lot of times, when you are using only the vents on the more-or-less downwind sides of the coop. Thus, you want to make sure they will be sufficient.

And our door is just a hole cut out of the coop, you mean we have to figure out how to close it? Should we just make a door for it that we close at night?

Yes. Especially up here and going into winter

It is not hard. Just look at peoples' coop pages, you will see various ways of doing it.

So you're saying I could add another vent on the same wall where the vent already is? <snip> or you're saying I can add one on the back wall near the east end of it right?

Yes. Either should be fine. Vent over nestbox probably doesn't matter in your case, they don't spend that much time in the box and it's a well-sheltered vent, and frankly in a small coop one just doesn't have a lot of choice, the vents are always going to be close to *something*

Or were you saying I should block off the East facing vent?

Nope, that should be good for most or all of the winter. Even in a good storm from the E the fence and the hood will probably provide adequate protection to leave that vent open.

Yes, it is possible that the one existing vent would be enough. IME it is also possible it will *not*, though, and it is a lot easier to take care of that possibility now than to wait til there are 2 feet of snow and it's -25 C and your chickens already have frostbit combs

You know, for all your self-deprecating comments, that is really a great little coop you've built there, very useful and sturdy and easy on the eyes, and more winterizeable than nearly all the other very-small coops I've seen people come up with. So I really think you are in pretty reasonable shape if you put in a pophole door (I would say this is virtually non-negotiable) and ideally another vent

Good luck, have fun,

Pat​

 

[Hatrick]

Self-deprecating? Of course! We're Canadian! What can I say?

I understand now, very good. Thanks!

 

[PortageGirl]

I like it too! I wouldn't worry about using some hay or straw bales as a wind break and some insulation etc. Yes, you may get a few mice taking shelter, but really it'll probably be pretty ok. I agree about putting some plastic around/over/whatever on their little run, they'll be out there in winter cold as others have said, gives them some extra room!

They'll really appreciate the shelter and space, and won't mind the cold most of the time. you can feed them out there on nicer days too, keep some mess out of the sleeping area.

Having lived in some heavy snow country, (Alaska, Upstate NY, Colorado...) you might want to make some sort of slanted peak up top, if you did it right,... trying to think how to say it... you can have a little venting going on there. Snow on top would give awesome insulation, but it also can seal things up tight and prevent ventilation. I'm going to draw something... back in a few mins.

 

[PortageGirl]

OK look at this, if this were over top, and it doesn't have to be a really high peak I just threw up this to illustrate, and you put the front (or back or side, whichever is south I'd say) flat part just with plastic, it would gather some warmth on sunny days. This would be over the existing flat roof, not in place of it. Does that make sense? What do you other more experienced people think of this idea?

 

[Sissy]

coop and ruin looks great, its a place to
give shelter, feed and water..

 

[Little Ameraucana Mom]

I think your coop is adorable, I made some, kind of like it, but my are no where as nice as yours. I'm no carpenter, and I have to do everything around here. They work is about all I can say about mine.