North to Alaska!

[chicksak]

Love the greenhouse idea. Our 4 girls have the 10x 10 green house all year, complete with extra large roofed in run. Hopefully we have done a well enough job that they will have lots of snow free area's this year.

 

[shabbychix]

Where do you live and what is your temp range in winter?

 

[Alaskan]

Oh, I have it easy. I rarely get super cold, I think a week of -10 is my usual lowest temp. My problem is I get quite a bit of wind, and high humidity, so I have to really watch my vents since I don't want the arctic blasts going through the coop, but it is easy for the birds to get frostbite because of the high humidity.

My greenhouse is a ripple plastic one, 8 foot by 16 with no vents. That is connected to my chicken shed that is a dirt/sand floor and 8x16 with lots of venting. The shed connects to my coop which is 8 x8 and insulated and has some vents.

 

[Alaskan]

I live on the Kenai peninsula, I am at a super high elevation, but I can still see the water from my house.

 

[chicksak]

I live in Wasilla and also have to deal with the high winds. We got our first chickens this spring and are working hard on making sure that are greenhouse/coop will be ready not only for the cold but for the high winds. With any luck this winter is milder then the last couple of years.

 

[DinkerGiggles]

Would some of you be willing to post some photos of your set-up. Would love to get a visual to your words!

Husband, myself, and our four young boys are snow/winter lovers and looking into a move to the Tok area (anyone in that area). I'm already into other self-sufficiency with gardening, canning, composting, cloth diapers, etc. Just now thinking about how we can extend that with chicken, eggs, and perhaps goats for the milk.

Thanks!

 

[Alaskan]

The biggest thing that helped me with my high wind and the vents was

1. Take a string (imaginary or real) and run it between each vent. Make sure that line does not cross perches.

2. Baffle vents, or at least something like that. Try not to give the wind a straight shot into the coop.

I found that open eaves are TERRIBLE, it funnels the wind into a blast. But a vent lower on the wall, even on the same wall, is no where near as bad.

I try to not have any moving air at the perches or right over the perches. But I can't have it totally sealed up, because my humidity is always so high, and high humidity greatly increases frost bite.

 

[BolanSixx]

I was wondering, any of you here in Fairbanks interested in buying our Americauna rooster?

 

[chicksak]

This probably isn't the place for this, but being the time difference to most of the lower 48, I was hoping that I would have better luck here. My 12 week old rooster was attached by a dog this evening. It appears that is was only feathers that were lost and no broken skin. He has eaten and drank a little but not much, my guess is that he is sore and in a bit of shock. After it happened I put him in the coop, while the girls were out, and he rested for about 15 minutes then started squawking at me and coming to the door to be let out, so I did. He has been moving around a bit but mostly lying in a corner relaxing, sometimes the girls will come join him, which is normal. My question is should I leave him in the coop with everyone tonight or separate him into a temporary pen in the house? I heard that its best to separate them to prevent them from hiding their pain in order to not be picked on. Any advice?

 

[AK Baha]

I live in Alaska and have 6 chickens and am also new at this. We are building an insulated coop and will have a red heat lamp on when it is real cold and a white light on a timer for 14 hours a day. Give them scratch at least once a day. Have a heater for water.