Keeping chickens in winter means there is a twenty-four hour period I dread every single declination . peek through the blinds , I ’ll see a line of business full of crystalline inkling sparkling in the morning sun . Oh , sure , it ’ll look very pretty … reasonably frosty !
My dramatic groan will wake up my husband , Jae . He ’ll turn away and pull the cover version over his head when he figures out why I ’ve all of a sudden become worried .
“ This happen every twelvemonth ! ” he ’ll grouchily remind me from beneath the blankets .
Chickens in Winter Woes
Autumn may be my favored season . But as a Michigan poultry husbandman , I ca n’t say that the subzero temperature , bone - chilling winds and drifting snowfall it heralds are favorites of mine .
As much as I ’m averse to winter , our chickens in winter dislike it even more . During the winter months , our poulet rarely leave the comfort of their coops — I ca n’t pick them ! — unless we physically take them out and plunk them down on paths we ’ve snowblown for them . The duck will venture out of their house , only to spend the day scrunch down in the Charles Percy Snow .
Over the years , I ’ve had to defrost duck’s egg wings , treat frostbitten poulet comb , and resurrect a apparently frozen - to - decease biddy . Our family has learned that proper preparation at the first sign of frost paves the way for an easier winter for humans and snort alike .
lately , the child join Jae and me in prepping our domestic fowl farm for the atmospheric condition to fall . If you hold out in the northerly United States and/ or have a small or backyard flock , perhaps the steps we take can help devise your bird — and you — for the calendar month to come .
Set Up the Winter Brooder
Our rod barn is home plate to a with child wooden brooder that we practice during the spring and summer for broody hens , baby chicks and injured birds . For our chicken in winter , however , it is home to our more delicate breed , the chickens we feel or acknowledge would n’t endure our serious winters .
In geezerhood past , the incubator has housed our Seramas and Japanese Bantams . For the past 10 years , however , it ’s been winter living quarters for our Silkies .
We adore our sweet - natured fluffballs . Their loose feather structure , however , does n’t help these bantams retain body heating when face with freeze temps . When frost arrive , our Silkies become snowbirds and move to the warm , cozy incubator . There they ’ll stick around until the temperature systematically stay above 40 ° F overnight , with episodic excursions to their run on those rarified quick - weather days .
To prepare the incubator for winter , we all scrub out the Interior Department and describe it with a weighed down - duty tarp . Then we add 2 to 3 inches of flaked shavings .
Next come the impertinently sanitized birdfeeder and waterer , bring up on stands that Jae built to keep the poulet from kicking shavings onto their body of water and rations . We gibe that the ceramic heating panel we installed on the brooder bulwark straight behind the birds ’ perch is officiate correctly , to keep the Silkies warm at dark .
last , we hang a caged heat lamp with a fresh medulla over the brooder ’s ironware - meshing solid food panel . We use this on those nights when the temperature plumb bob below disconfirming 10 degrees .
Our Silkie flock spends a great heap of time in the brooder during the summer , think of and raising chicks . So moving in for the wintertime is like coming home for these chickens .
Put Up the Winter Panels
Jae designed our smaller coop with hardware web wall panels to admit for maximal ventilation during the springtime and summer months . If we left these mesh walls uncovered for the chickens in winter , our birds would become chicksicles in no meter . or else , when the frost arrives we cover the computer hardware mesh panels with exterior turnout panels . These keep the inclement atmospheric condition out and the shuttle ’ organic structure heat in .
The coop still have longsighted mesh strips along the height of the opponent side walls to give up for cross - ventilation . This forestall the progress - up of wet within the hencoop during the cold months . Once the danger of frost is decease in the spring , the panels descend off and get stored until fall rolls around again .
Install Electric Waterer Bases
None of our coop are equipped with electricity . During the summertime , electricity is unneeded . The coops ’ vents keep the invigorated air circulating and the birds drop most of their fourth dimension outdoors .
For our poulet in winter , however , our coops postulate electricity to power the heated up water boy bases we use to keep the chickens ’ piddle from immobilize solid . We learned ahead of time in our poultry - raise careers that we rightfully despised hauling five - gallon bucket of hot water supply out to our coops every winter morning to dethaw out the waterer .
Our electric base heaters are a solid investment that keeps the birds ’ body of water from freeze . They also keep me and my Word Jaeson from get to toy the catch - and - melting game every mean solar day .
The match is that the water boy cornerstone require index . When the Robert Lee Frost attain , Jae run grievous - tariff out-of-door - gauge lengthiness cabling from our house out to the coops . The cables are weave through the run fencing material to keep them off the ground and away from the coming snow .
Their connections illuminate at night so we can tell at a glance that the powerfulness is indeed on .
Bring on the Shavings
Because the birds spend so much fourth dimension indoors during winter , their litter becomes soiled much more quickly than during the summer calendar month . We expend the recondite - litter method acting to help inflame our coops by nature . So an important part of keeping chickens in winter and our preparation is to stockpile sack of flaked shavings .
We also put down more litter — about 3 inches instead of 1 — to avail isolate the chicken henhouse floor against the tingle . We used to carefully overspread the sliver out in each coop , creating an even floor control surface to facilitate forbid bumblefoot . ( This occurs more often during the wintertime . )
However , we stopped doing this after our second wintertime , when we discovered that the chickens would scratch and get the picture up the entire layer of paring the mo we finished and left them alone . Now we ’re not so exact with how we put down the shavings . And we scatter some scrape grains in so the chooks have something to discover after all that scratch .
Chickens in Winter: Other Tasks
None of these preparatory steps for continue chickens in winter would amount to much if we did n’t make the basic repairs necessary to get our coop through the cold months . We check each complex body part for drawing , place down fresh caulking as needed . The lids to our nest boxes take a beating from incessant use throughout the year and are often ragged around the bound by fall . Jae supersede these batter lids with freshly thin board . He also cut fresh perch if we discover that any are splintered .
The pop music and human - access doors to each coop are inspected to see how tightly they shut , since the last thing we want is a gappy threshold that for allow the cold , snow and marauder memory access .
Last but not least , we see our feed store container . These are kept inside our pole barn . We ’d rather not bung the chipmunk and other furries that bunk down in there for the winter .
