need advice about new Pullet-Shut auto pop door & winter??

[JLS]

I live here in Maine and I have recently purchased the Pullet-Shut automatic chicken door. I'm very excited. Upon it's arrival I noticed that it has 1/4" gap on the hinge side and 1/8" gap on the other 3 sides. I did call the company for some advice with regard to "winterizing" it. He brought up a few valid points about it's design (very nice person by the way). One of which is ventilation.

I have twice as many chickens this year as I did last year

I keep them VERY clean, but last night I closed the window to the coop and was very upset by the way the coop's air quality was not so good. I thought I had plenty of ventilation...I guess I do for 10 not 20 chickens.

So here's what I was wondering: The location of the door is below one end of a lower roost. Would it be appropriate for me to install the new door as is? It averages about 20F in the dead of winter and many times drops to 0-10F at night (occasioanly it dips below 0 but not too often). I did not heat my coop last year and it is not insulated. My birds did very well. You can see my coop by looking at my BYC page. The location of the door is shown on the photo entitled "right side - covered run". And another photo entitled "Inside" .... the door is located in the corner, beside the nest box and under the lower roost where a SL Wyandotte is sitting.

Would it provide better air quality but not endager the welfare of my babies? What do you think? Here's a link to the site http://chickendoors.com/products-2.htm

 

[Judy]

You may still need to increase the ventilation near or at the top of your coop.

On the other hand, the air needs someplace to come in, in order to encourage the movement up and out, so leaving the pop door as is makes sense to me.

You have to crack a window to burn a fire in a fireplace, right?

 

[JLS]

Has anyone installed one of these doors in a colder climate? What did you do??