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- #11
AngelinaThePekin8
Crowing
Yeah, I wasn't planning on closing up all the cracks until I figure out the ventilation, and i was thinking of making an open side or something like that. And I don't know currently what the foundation is I guess, Idk I will try and get pictures of under the coop tomorrow.I wouldn't block the cracks the snow is coming in until you add ventilation to at least replace the cracks.
Three good ways to do ventilation are: raise the roof so air can come in between the walls and the roof. Or raise part of the roof in a monitor style or cupola. Or open one side of the coop.
I am not sure if you can change the roof; possibly raise it a few inches?
I did the open side method. It works when the rest of the coop is pretty much air tight. It also needs to be deep enough for how wide (maybe also how high) it is. 8 feet of open width per 12 feet of depth works. So does 6 feet of open width per 10 feet of depth. I haven't seen it scaled any smaller than that; it might need to be at least a minimum depth to work well for chickens.
There are no drafts because air has no opening to flow out so it can't rush in. The chickens breath out moist air which is warm so it rises. This pulls air in from the bottom on the open side. As the warm air cools, it flows out the top of the open side but no faster than the chickens breath rises. Well, on sunny days it flows a little faster from the sun warming the air but still no draft.
I don't know all the details of the other two good ways but in both cases, wide eaves work well to shelter the open areas so snow and rain are blocked. Think a foot or more of roof overhang.
You might add hurricane ties to hold the roof on. And to hold the coop to the foundation or the coop to the skids and to anchor the skids. Or posts or piers or whatever your foundation is.
I have been thinking that I could make a all year round hardware cloth door, that maybe could be covered for specific types of weather. The red outline would be hardware cloth or something along those lines.
And I was thinking that for now just drilling some holes high up on the wall until I can make a hardware cloth door? Or whatever I decide to do.