Home at Last, New Plans

OK, my Odyssey is complete. I am home. In the process, I experienced long distance driving, family fun, and loss.

My trusted friend, Doctor Dolittle, found my dead hen on Christmas morning and hastily improved the chicken coop. Doc tells me the chickens are agitating for some more coop improvements.

• The pen gets really soggy when it rains. 
• The roosts need a drop ceiling.
• The door catches on the bird net. (might be a human requirement)
• The nest boxes need external access. (um, ditto?)

*sigh* Back to the drawing board.

Re-winterizing the coop

While I was away, we had a cold snap hard on the heels of horizontal rain. This tragically exposed another design flaw and my friend Dr. Dolittle found one of the hens dead on Christmas morning.

Thankfully, Doc rounded up an assistant and the two of them blocked more of the vents with plastic. They inspected each chicken for dry feathers and feet. They even provided big towels to help the chickens think about sunny beaches.

It was a lifesaving improvement. The temps dropped close to 20F. In the morning Doc had to chip out all the water bowls and make arrangements to replace split pipes and hoses.

All the chickens made it. And fresh eggs too!

If this weather keeps up I may have to order a water heater:

The Weather Outside Is Frightful

Here in Texas we are having what is locally known as cold weather at 27F degrees. (I'm not from around here).

I had to take special precautions for my chickens. They already let me know they do not approve of exposed roosts during cool weather. I corrected that once I realized the entire flock had spent the night crammed into one nest box.

The coop is a masterpiece of opportunistic construction from salvaged materials. It is half plywood and half farm fence. This is great for the Texas summer, but it is as useless as something colorful on a bull when it is cold enough to freeze something colorful off a brass monkey.

To protect the birds from drafts I put 6 mil plastic sheets up with roofing nails. That, and a bit of clear duct tape, sealed things up on two sides. The narrow end with the pop door has no coverage. The long side with the people door has a three foot stretch of uncovered wire as well. All told, the coop has 35 square feet of ventilation. The rest is covered. Especially around the roost.

There is no insulation. The litter is not very deep. There is no water heater. There is no heat source.

The chickens are heated internally! They have a warm blooded metabolism. They have feathers. They have a roost that lets them keep their feet flat and settle their fluffy feathery bodies on them. And they get a double ration of insanely delicious Black Oil Sunflower Seeds at night.

Now there may be an issue with ice in the waterer by morning, but they really do not drink much water while they sleep. The big risk is that the moisture they emit while sleeping (and pooing) will build up in the coop and in their little chicken lungs.

So there is the strategy. Keep the chickens out of the wind. Keep them dry. Give them a little extra food.

Meanwhile, I am wearing a down jacket.


Update1:
I lost a chicken to the cold because I failed to follow my plan. I failed to cover part of the coop where a horizontal rain could soak the birds and bedding, foiling my "keep them dry" concept. I have since put more effort into making sure the coop is dry and non-drafty. The chickens have been fine through multiple colder rainier weather events with no problems.

Update2:
BackYardChickens.com member patandchickens has an excellent winter coop discussion posted there.

Wrong Roost!

I am really mad at myself right now.

I have been working on my coop, making useful improvements. Until today, that is.

I changed the roost. CHICKEN DISASTER!

The chickens were OK until it was time to sleep. They could not see the old roost, no matter how hard they looked. Eventually they got on the new roost and I left them. When I checked on them a few minutes ago there were no chickens on the roost!

I could not see the chickens no matter how hard I looked. Then it dawned on me, the familiar old elevated nest box is about a half inch higher that the new alien horrible fattening immoral roosting planks.

Every single chicken was piled into the nest box. *sigh*


Update: They were all on the roost this morning once it warmed up. Gave them better weather protection today and tonight they are roosting in style.