Think it's too cold for your chickens? Think again...

[vmdanielsen]

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I have heard of a 3 dog night, but a 4 dog night? Must be really, really cold!!!

 

[toofarout]

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I have heard of a 3 dog night, but a 4 dog night? Must be really, really cold!!!

I have only 1 dog. Need to get 3 more!

 

[frostbite]

I didn't mean to have four dogs! One of them should have died of old age by now, and another is an old and decrepit lab/chow with congestive heart failure that we took in when his owner moved out of town, didn't think the dog would transition well, and our place is kind of like a handicapped accessible geriatric dog facility, not intentionally, but he fits in. And now the competition to survive between the two elderly dogs is going to make them outlive the two pups!

Oy!

At least the two old nearly blind, deaf, and arthritic dogs aren't likely to chase chicks!

 

[workinnanie]

We have a bit of a delima. We have two silkies sharing 6 eggs. They are nesting right next to each other in my pole barn. They are sitting on hay surrounded on three sides with bales of hay. There are a lot of bales of hay in their area. When one gets off of the nest the other one steals her eggs.
When the other one comes back she usually manages to get 2 of the eggs back. That has worked well as I am in Minnesota and it is getting cold at night (27-30 degrees). I should mention that my other three adult silkies join them and huddle close at night. It is in the 50's during the day. I would like to leave them in the barn with their moms if they hatch. My plan was to add a infra red heat lamp. I will also isolate them from the other adults once the babies hatch. I could raise them in the house if need be but would prefer to leave them with moms.
I have had banty babies this late in the season but never silkies. Just looking for your thoughts? They should hatch within the next 2-7 days. Thanks

 

[Mrs MIA]

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If this were my situation, I would separate the moms into their own pens now, and split the eggs between them. Don't worry about a heat lamp, as the moms will supply all the heat that is needed. Once the chicks are too big to be under mom, watch their behavior... if they're acting cold, add heat, but be careful with all that hay and dust around.

But I think you'll find that they do just fine, and you won't have to add heat. Look back a couple of pages to my post about my chicks. At 9 weeks old now, they have never had heat since leaving mom, and are outside in the freezing temps (currently 22F and snowing here, but got down to the mid teens the other day).

 

[workinnanie]

Thank you so much Mrs. AK. I really prefer to have the moms raise the babies. I will seperate the girls. They have done this before and I did have to seperate them as they got a little cranky with each other! It was warmer and the babies were fathered by a banty rooster. I just got a silkie rooster (picture attached) and he is my only rooster. So this is my first chance at getting some pure silkie babys. I can move them to a 12x 12 horse stall that my HH(handy hubby) has converted into a very secure area for my silkies. I can easily divide it in half. The walls are 2x6 fir. The floor is particle board with 4-5 inches of clean wood chips and the ceiling has particle board pannels. We plan to put plastic over the front of the stall. I was thinking of adding some straw for more warmth but not sure I should do that.
I also wonder what color babies the black hen might hatch? Thanks again for your great advice!

 

[Yonaton]

It's true, they don't get cold like we do.

My 18 week old White Giants still can't stand being out of the shade of anything, even when it's been in the low 30's in the mornings until close to noon. They're more than warm enough to survive what we would have trouble surviving in, low temperature-wise. About the only time they'll walk into the sunlight from any shadows is when I throw a mini bucket (~ 1 qt) of cracked corn out in the open in the grass somewhere so they'll scratch up the turf for me and fertilize the area a little. I do this in a different spot every day until I've covered all the areas I want fertilized, then start over at the first spot again (it'll take about 3 weeks for me to get back to the first spot, so I won't be wearing anything out at all). This also teaches them where all the nice clover patches are so that when it does get cool enough for them to walk in the sunlight without burning up, they'll know where to scratch for clover and good grass and such. We get a snow or two usually in February some time, but the rest of winter here it averages 35 throughout the winter months and in a little more than 25 years we've yet to see the chickens go back into the coop during any time of snowing unless it was time to go to roost. I've simply not seen any indications, ever, of my chickens getting cold. In the summer they even come *out* of the shade to walk around when it's raining to stay cool! Most days though, winter or summer, they can be found resting under the cedar trees (we have a huge grove in front of our house that hides us from the road, about 50+ 30 foot tall cedars and *only* cedars) rain, snow or shine.

 

[workinnanie]

Wow sounds like you have some ideal weather. We can get to 30-40 below zero so I have had weeks when my chickens didn't go out side at all. They were tough little bantys. I never heated the barn as it is too big (30x40 pole barn). They spent a lot of time in the hay! Now I have just 4 silkie ladies, one silkie rooster, a bantum/silkie cross female, 2 silkie babies I purchased 2 months ago & one female EE. I worry more about the silkies as they can't get up very high on the hay or rafters as the bantys did. I know they produce a lot of body heat though with all of their feathers. I hope we get through the winter OK.

 

[Mrs MIA]

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You're welcome! That sounds like a perfect nursery for the ladies.

And your white silkie is quite handsome... congrats! I know there are some threads on silkie color genetics... might check there.

Yonaton, where are you located? Your weather sounds lovely, and other than a major storm coming through, you don't need to worry about a thing!

 

[mshuey1]

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There are many opinions, I would not ever say yours is ridiculous. You know your situation best, but I believe it is unwarranted. You can see my page for my opinion, and what we do. Simply stated, In my opinion, it does not get cold enough to provide anything but food, shelter from predation and water. You would be better off, again in my opinion, to take the money you were considering spending and put it in the bank. You may need to build a bigger coop someday...

FWIW plastic barrels (or metal) painted black will absorb enough energy from the sun to stay mostly thawed. if you take the thawed water each day to fill up waterers you will not have to heat anything. If you put a box made of 2" rigid insulation over them at night to keep the heat in, and take it off in the morning, my guess is that you will have open water year round. You can get 2" insulated panels that are 'damaged' at the lumber yard at a huge discount, ours cost $5 bucks each. You can screw them together with drywall screws.

You have alot of great info on your BYC page. Thanks!