Preparing Your Flock & Coop for WINTER

[minnehaha]

You can see the highway from our dining room window and last night the cars were only going about 30 mph (speed limit is 75) and there were no 18-wheelers...and it is one of the busiest internodal highways in the area usually. Things opened late today but no closures. Definitely slowed everything down but at least not to a screeching halt.

This is fantastic news! It could have been so much worse and you would have heard it loud and clear since you are so close to the highway. It's good that so many people decided not to drive and those who did drive, drove slow!

 

[Ms Duty]

This is my first winter with my girls. 3 barred rocks and 2 Rhode Island reds. I insulated their run (7x30) with 6 mil clear plastic using wooden strips. The run is covered with clear corrugated plastic. The house is a large kids play fort turn chicken coop with insulated walls. I ran hooked up a 100w light bulb attached to a thermostat using the instructions found on this site. It works great! I have small feed and water containers attached to the wall that are actually horse mineral feeders. The 100w light is enough to keep the water from freezing. So far it has gotten down to 18F at night and the coop stays at 40F. I don't want to keep it too warm and shock the girls in the morning with cooler temps outside.

I also used straw in the coop and in the run. I then use this to cover the garden in the spring. Another thing I did was the cabbage tether ball I saw on this site. The girls love it! At first they didn't know what to do with it, but I left it up and within a 4 days it was gone. We get a steady 2 eggs a day. They just became old enough to lay in Oct. of this year.

Love the site and have learned a lot of useful things like the thermostat.

 

[starkist72]

This is our first winter with our coop. It holds our 7 girls really snugly. My husband made the coop out of barn boards, and so there's no insulation inside, other than the shavings, sand, and straw bedding I have mixed on the floor pretty deeply. I'm wondering if it will be too drafty for the winter and if I should cover the side or just the window with plastic sheeting. As you can see wind can blow in between the boards, but I don't want to completely rid them of ventilation. I do have two sides of the run sheeted off to block the wind for them a bit, but not sure if I should do the coop as well.

I also have a smallish coop, and I was concerned about them being locked up too tight in the winter. I want to keep them busy and healthy!
This is my first year, so I can't give seasoned advice, but I asked around and found a few solutions to try out, I thought I'd share (but feel free to correct me... I'm learning from everyone on here!) And please, add some ideas if you have any more!

First, I added a "loft" like second floor. Up here I put my food and hopefully eventually my water system, it saved on floor space and made the bottom floor more open for landing. (This worked out well when I didn't have chicks in the coop, right now it's all back down on the bottom for the chicks)

External nest boxes helped free up a ton of space

Then for winter someone suggested I make a sheltered outdoor area under my coop to give them some leg room during the day (there's a picture of my coop on pg 34 of this post), I'm planning on insulating that area with hay. I covered a portion of my run to provide a good sized area without snow (and I have extra roofing hanging around in case I need it)

 

[alifeouthere]

I also have a smallish coop, and I was concerned about them being locked up too tight in the winter. I want to keep them busy and healthy!
This is my first year, so I can't give seasoned advice, but I asked around and found a few solutions to try out, I thought I'd share (but feel free to correct me... I'm learning from everyone on here!) And please, add some ideas if you have any more!

First, I added a "loft" like second floor. Up here I put my food and hopefully eventually my water system, it saved on floor space and made the bottom floor more open for landing. (This worked out well when I didn't have chicks in the coop, right now it's all back down on the bottom for the chicks)

External nest boxes helped free up a ton of space

Then for winter someone suggested I make a sheltered outdoor area under my coop to give them some leg room during the day (there's a picture of my coop on pg 34 of this post), I'm planning on insulating that area with hay. I covered a portion of my run to provide a good sized area without snow (and I have extra roofing hanging around in case I need it)

Thank you so much for the tips! We have a "loft" like second floor that definitely adds space. Our run is sheltered, but I may add on under the run as well to give them a little extra protection and room to stretch out. I'm also thinking of mounting a few feeders to the walls so they don't take up the floor.

Just got a phone call that one of my friends found a loose chicken and is looking to home it. I'd have my husband start adding onto the chicken coop right away if deer season didn't open this week! Then I could take on the hen! Maybe he'll reach his tag limit quick so he can get onto important things...like the chicken coop remodel

 

[iwiw60]

Thank you so much for the tips! We have a "loft" like second floor that definitely adds space. Our run is sheltered, but I may add on under the run as well to give them a little extra protection and room to stretch out. I'm also thinking of mounting a few feeders to the walls so they don't take up the floor.

Just got a phone call that one of my friends found a loose chicken and is looking to home it. I'd have my husband start adding onto the chicken coop right away if deer season didn't open this week! Then I could take on the hen! Maybe he'll reach his tag limit quick so he can get onto important things...like the chicken coop remodel

Remember, if you take in that stray chicken you should definitely isolate her from your current flock just in case of illness/disease.

 

[RedRidge]

Brrrr... 21 degrees here with snow and high winds. Is it really only November?
The chicks in the outside brooder were snuggled up together this morning and the rabbits have made burrows. But apparently the larger animals could care less.

 

[Fletch83]

Brrrr... 21 degrees here with snow and high winds. Is it really only November?
The chicks in the outside brooder were snuggled up together this morning and the rabbits have made burrows. But apparently the larger animals could care less.

It was 25 here this morning - in Texas!! No wind though, so that made a big difference. My hens did NOT care.

 

[iwiw60]

It was 25 here this morning - in Texas!! No wind though, so that made a big difference. My hens did NOT care.

Got you both beat! Temp at 4 am was 6 above zero....girls in the coop were at 34...yay!

 

[NTBugtraq]

Well, I thought I'd throw in a description of my solution, and a report on its functionality.

I went for an EasyHeat Pipe Heating Cable w/Thermostat, to apply to a 1/2" CPVC pipe attached to a hosebib on my house within my run. On the end of that was a Miller Manufacturing King Size Automatic Fount. I ran the heating cable the entire length of the pipe, and then draped it under the fount. Everything seemed fine, but over-night the system failed. The thermostat has to be placed on the pipe, so there's a section of pipe that isn't heated. In my case, that was the section within 4" of the hose bib, so the hose bib froze. Also, the valve on the fount end froze as it also didn't have cable on it. Now to their credit, EasyHeat expect you to have insulation on the line around the heating cable, which I did not have. However, after talking to a Tech Support rep at EasyHeat, we agreed that even with full insulation chances are the two ends would still freeze.

So, what I have now is their PSR heating cable, which is the type of heating cable you'd run along an eavestrough or a downspout. One big difference between the two types of cables is that the PSR cable can be wrapped over itself, so you can use it to twist around things like the hose bib. One downside is there's no thermostat with the PSR, so it runs constantly, albeit at 5watts per foot (so not really that much cost). I haven't installed this PSR cable yet, so can't say whether this will solve the problems, but, certainly the thermostatic EasyHeat pipe heating cable doesn't work.

FWIW, if I ran a line from inside the house to the run, split of the line to the bib inside the wall, I could run the thermostatically controlled cable into the wall of the house, thereby preventing freezing at the hose bib (by eliminating the outdoor bib). Still doesn't solve the problem at the fount end though.

In case you're wondering, the entire rig is attached to the south wall of my house, within the chicken run, protected from wind. The bib and fount froze at temperatures between 25F and 32F for one day.

I will again ask, if anyone else has this part figured out, namely how to keep a hose bib from freezing outside, chime in.

Cheers,
Russ

 

[auntphibian]

I struggle with what to do with pur 2 ducks. The Indian runner gets cold easier than the pekin and since we let them sleep in our basement, I'm thinking that I shouldn't let them out in the pen once temps get to be in the upper 20's/ lower 30's as a high. The basement is around 62 degrees and I think the shock of going from that to teens in the morning won't be a good idea.

I thought ducks are mold cold he as rty than chickens. Don't they only need outdoor shelter? If you leave them in a 62 degree basement for the winter put a baby pool in there for swimming. Research those duck breeds, cause I don't think you have to keep them in basement, just provide drat free shelter outside. I think you are right. Leaving a basement that warm with that sudden of a temp drop could be a problem, but maybe not for ducks. They are built pretty weather resustant. Maybe someone with lots of experience here will chime in