Ventilation during day and night question.

[SpunkyTheMonkey]

can a coon reach the windows? because if they can't then you don't need to be so paranoid about their ability to get through them. i'm with pat, plan to make the windows predator proof and leave them open.

to give you some kind of reference point, our coop is 43 sq ft on the inside for 3 standards. i have 2 4x4" vents and a large opening in the floor (30x160cm) for the ramp which stays open 24x7 providing air flow to the inside (no predator problem here). i knew i was pushing my luck a bit with the ventilation but design constraints made it difficult to provide more easily. it has a bathroom ventilation fan which provides air flow between the vents at each end and i'm currently having to run it 24x7 to keep the smell of ammonia down, and i'm going to have to retro-fit some more ventilation somehow.

 

[patandchickens]

If you are worried about a raccoon pushing the hardware cloth in, you can put extra supports behind it -- wood or rebar -- so that the force is transferred to those supports.

You can try it with just your small vents open at night, and depending on your climate and how much moisture source you have in your coop (hint: droppings boards, cleaned every morning with the poo removed from coop, would help a lot with humidity), you *might* get away with it. You'd have to see, though - it is by no means a foregone conclusion.

Good luck, have fun,

Pat

 

[ChooksChick]

If your area is 4 x 7 and that's all the birds you have in it, I wouldn't expect to see any ill effects from overnighting with a slight decrease in your venting. I had 6 standard BR in an area which was 4x4x4 for overnighting, and they were perfectly fine- it's not as though ammonia builds up immediately as the poop falls, and if it's open in the day, the poop will dry and become less problematic. They free-ranged all day and the poops from the night previous were all that ever inside, so it wasn't a large amount of poo, mind you.