Hi Stacy
We live in the high country of Colo. Our winters will have a couple weeks of -30 night temps and days that don't get above 0, and then there is the wind. After much advise from other in the area and help from many of those on this list, we did the following: 1)choose "cold hardy" chickens 2)put a small electric heater in the coop 3)have a heated water dish (actually it was a dog/cat dish and worked very well 4)have a small partly covered run for winter -- this run has a tarp over about half of it, which give the hens some protection and some dry dirt to play in 5)they get in and out of this run via a small pet door which I close down at night 6)at one point the heater broke and we added staw bails to the inside of the coop, making it smaller. Our coop is insulated, and there is straw on the floor. No its not air tight, but well insulated.
We've had hens for 2 winters and so far so good
Rita
--- In CHICKENS-101@yahoogroups.com, "slrmurray" <slrmurray@...> wrote:
>
> I live in Alberta, Canada. This year our winter temperatures were in the - 20 to - 40C range (including wind chill)January to March with lots of snowfall.
>
> I had no bird losses over the winter. I had 8 Isa brown layers in an insulated coup with straw bedding. This coop has a chicken size opening to the yard (no door to close) and their food and water were outside. I brought the 2 silkie roos into the barn. They lived in a small area with straw bales on either side of their enclosure. When the snow got 6 inches high in the outdoor uninsulated a-frame coop, I brought the bantam wyandottes into the barn too but only because they had a hard time getting to their food and water. I drape a tarp over the open part of the a-frame. It cuts the wind and keeps a lot of snow off the ground.
>
> It's hard to keep the coop bedding dry and clean. Most of the winter I just added another layer of straw, because what was there was frozen solid.
>
> Susan
> PS They're forecasting more snow in our area overnight tonight.
CHICKENS-101@yahoogroups.com
No comments:
Post a Comment