Winterizing

[mechanic57]

Which is better is a matter of personal preference and available space among other factors. everybody I know that has a moveable setup uses that for Cornish hens or or other meat birds that grow to 7-8 lbs in about 8-10 weeks then you butcher them for meat. Depending on how many birds they want to have or sell, they'll do between 2-4 groups of these between spring and fall, then have just egg birds in a permanent setup year round and now have anything living in the mobile setup through the winter.

 

[3 Dozen a Week]

Thanks again. Before we started up this year, I figured it would be healthier for the birds and the land/grass, but now I've come to see that the poop doesn't disintegrate that fast and it attracts flies, so that is something I need to change regardless of the set up. I know winter will take care of the flies for a while, but I want to see come spring if it's better to clean off the hard surface than scraping it off the grass to which it became firmly stuck on. Once I put a base onto the coop I don't think I can move it, it's heavy enough already.
Did your hens destroy all vegetation?
That's what I've seen around and I'd like mine to run on the grass, because I've seen how they enjoy pecking it.
Anyway I guess I'll have to have my set up for winter done by early November. I've got to research the water issue soon. I've definitely been helped by everyone that's responded so thank you all.

 

[mechanic57]

Mine have completely removed the grass and all the leaves on the bushes within the fenced in run. Then they dug holes so they could lay in the holes in the shade of the trees on hot days to stay cool and dust bath. The whole set up is on a part of the property where the grass ends and the woods begins. They are 2 tree rows back into the woods so they have shade all day and half of the run has permanent leaf coverage from leaves falling off this time of year. They scratch and peck through that during the day until I let them out in the afternoon. I put some logs in the run and theres some perches for them to fly up on. They stay content as long as they aren't over crowded.

The outside poo doesn't seam to draw too many flies and doesn't seem to stay around for long. I had more problems in the past with it in the coop until I got the poop board set up that I have.

 

[3 Dozen a Week]

What an ideal situation.
We began work on the winter coop today. Building up walls and putting the co-op onto it. It'll be tall, which I hope will help with having more air in the coop. We're just going to try using the one coop for now as the other is in use and they lay in it during the day, we can't have it out of use for any time while we build onto it. We're planning to add poop decks as well.
About the electric and light...
How do you run electric to the coop, extension wire or underground? Did you say you use a light to keep up egg production or not?

 

[mechanic57]

I thought about running electric underground because I've had training on how to install solar panels, electrical sub-panels, and how to do load calculations and properly size wires and conduits per the National Electric Code, but its too far away from the house to go through all the effort to trench the yard just to lay wire to the chicken coop. I did it for my detached garage. I run an extension cord to the coop just in the winter. Its a outdoor rated cord and I plug it into an outlet on the side of my house that has the ground fault buttons that will shut off the outlet if there's a short (like the outlets in newer bathrooms). In the coop on the ceiling is a small 3 outlet power strip. The chickens cannot reach any of it.

In one outlet, I have a timer plugged in. The timer has an outlet on it. What ever is plugged into the timer gets activated at the time you program in. I plug the light bulb into the timer. I have a small round base for the bulb to screw into and the base has 2 prongs to go right into the outlet.

In the second outlet, I plug in a device called a Thermo Cube . Its a temperature sensing outlet that has an outlet on it (2 outlets actually). It would turn on what ever you plug into it at 35 degrees and turn it off at 45 degrees. Its Thermo Cube model TC-3. Other models have different temp set points like 70 and 78 degrees, so if you go this route, use model TC-3. For heating the water last winter I used a home made heating device known as a cookie tin water heater (search it on this site, lots of info and pics about it, easy to make). It worked very well and kept the water from freezing when the over night temps were in the low single digits. The water container I had was only 3 or 5 gallons. I have a much bigger water contain now so I plan on using something else.

It might sound like a jumbled mess, but its not too bad. The chickens could only reach the one wire coming down from the roof to the cookie tin heater but they never bothered to peck at it or do anything to it. I wrapped that wire with plastic flexible automotive conduit just to give them an extra layer to go through and I would visually check it when I refilled the water to see if they were pecking at it and destroying the plastic shielding but they never bothered it.

 

[3 Dozen a Week]

Super, this is all very helpful! Sounds more doable than the underground way for me.