Zone 3 Winter Chicken Coop Tour | What Works, What Doesn't | Deep Litter Bedding | Heat Lamp Debate

[@NonaMaryGrace1952]

Interesting. Beautiful coop. Love the chickens hate winter. 💕NonnaGrace 🐓

[@NonaMaryGrace1952]

We love our automatic door. We have ours set on the time setting. 💕NonnaGrace 🐓

[@urbangardeningandchickenke1018]

Beautiful set-up

[@borealbloomhomestead]

Thank you! We absolutely love our chicken coop and run!

[@trumpzilla4193]

Well done! Thank-you!

[@borealbloomhomestead]

Thanks for watching!

[@MrSpinnerbug]

Very nice! One suggestion for your run door. Instead of tarp hanging over it, screw clear acryllic panels to the door frame. It works great, lets light in wind, snow and rain out. Easily removable in spring. Not sure i agree with heat lamps, maybe a heat panel but lamps are so dangerous…otherwise nice job! 😊🐓🐓

[@borealbloomhomestead]

I love this idea. I meant to reply to you right when you wrote it, Kevin and I even discussed it! I will likely do that next winter. Heat lamps are one of those things, I know that they are well secured into the roof, and very high up from the wood shavings. For me, it's one of those leap of faith things. We just had the polar vortex rip through here this week and the temps hit as low as -65f. I don't know that heat panels would be able to take the edge off that kind of cold. As it was, our coop dipped as low as -5f. BRR!

[@DoubleVisionHomestead]

Very nice looking!

[@terryhamus2277]

I live in northern Wisconsin. I've been a carpenter most of my life. I also know a little about air exchange. And lm planning to get chickens this spring. I should also state I grew up with chickens my folks had them. This is my own opinion but when I build my coop its going to be eight feet wide. The back wall facing the west will be five feet tall that's where the roost will go. The front wall will be seven feet tall facing the east .that wall will be mostly glass .everything will be well insulated. And yes I know I will have to cover all that glass in the summer time. I'm going to try three inch PVC pipes in the roof to draw the moisture out we will see if this works it works for septic systems so I don't see why not. What I'm getting at is from what I've read is you should have 4 square feet per chicken for them too be happy but you don't need all that headroom for them to heat with there body heat hopefully keeping the coop warmer .I'm probably wrong but I'm going to give it a try. I also putting openings on both ends of the coop hinged on top for air flow in the summer and keep the rain out .I'm kicking this idea around hopping to get some insight from other people. I liked your video very much. I hope I can learn something from everyone.

[@borealbloomhomestead]

Hey Terry, I agree that the birds don't need a ton of headroom, but in our case, we purchased this coop built as is, so we're working with what we've got. It is fully insulated, and I'm assuming the original builder used the bathroom exhaust fan to avoid adding passive vents. I'm sure passive vents placed along the walls just below the roof would work just as well. I assume you get nasty winter weather in Wisconsin, too? We live where Celcius and Fahrenheit meet often (-40) haha, so our coop requirements are a little different than a lot of the channels on KZbin. Our coop inside dimensions are 8 feet wide and 12 feet long and 14 feet tall. Right now I have 20 birds in the coop, and they seem to be getting along just fine. We watch pretty close for cooped-up behavior and haven't seen any signs of it, but we do make sure they have quite a bit of outdoor space to spread out, even with a few feet of snow right now. To be honest, unless they are laying or it's miserably cold, they are almost always outside from sun up to sun down. They basically only sleep and lay in the coop which is pretty nice. We've actually discussed lowering the ceiling to reduce that air space. Maybe next year, we will see how the projects pile up in the warm months haha. Glad you enjoyed the video, it was a lot of fun to document the process! Enjoy your chicken adventure! I know that we really have enjoyed having birds on the homestead :)

[@terrymacleod6882]

well that was great. nice tour. where did you locate your heat lamp?

[@borealbloomhomestead]

Really happy you enjoyed it! The heat lamps are located on the side of the coop opposite the chicken door. There are 2 lamps chained to the ceiling and they are held a few feet above the top roosting bar. You can see them a little more clearly in our Part 2 of the chicken coop tour at around the 8 minute mark kzbin.info/www/bejne/gYGpl62Ki8-EnrM&t. Hopefully that helps, if not let me know whatever questions you have and we will take a quick video for you! This system actually works excellent, and having the staggered bars underneath the heat lamp allows all the birds to roost in the warmest space when it's super cold.

[@ECole-le7we]

Please don't apologize for providing supplemental heat for your chickens. It is absolutely the humane thing to do. I know a lot of chicken keepers say that chickens can “survive” cold temperatures. I would think they would want their chickens not to just survive but to thrive year-round. In a fact sheet entitled, “Caring for chickens in cold weather,” the University of Minnesota Extension recommends: 1) Provide supplemental heat when coop temperatures fall below 35 degrees F. 2) …provide supplemental heat at the height of the nest boxes or lower rung of the roost. Placing a thermometer on the wall at each of these heights can help you track coop temperatures. Radiant heat sources heat the birds but not the surrounding air space. P.S. You might want to consider putting a roof on your run to keep the snow out.

[@borealbloomhomestead]

I agree with the University of Minnesota! Our thermometer is just below the height of our main roosting bars, which most birds sleep on. We talked about a roof, but one thing we didn't want to deal with was snow load and having to engineer a roof to withstand it. We decided to go with the mesh roof for that reason. I makes a little more work in the winter when we have heavy snow winters, but so far this winter, we've only had about 2 inches of snow, so it's been almost no work!

[@nathanziegman9262]

Thanks for the detailed video. We're getting through our first winter in zone 4 with chickens and have a few changes to make for our birds. Which heaters are you using?

[@borealbloomhomestead]

So happy you enjoyed it. It's pretty niche content haha! I am using heat lamps, they are secured to the coop roof with chains and hang a few feet above the roosting bar on the wall opposite the run door. They have worked awesomely. There are 2 though, the roof of our coop is vaulted, so a shorter roofed coop may need only 1. At -40c it ends up being around -10c during the day while the door is open and a bit warmer during the night when the door is closed.

[@nathanziegman9262]

@Boreal Bloom Homestead Thanks, our small flock (9) has been keeping the interior temp about 10 above ambient but that's not enough. Going to need to add something, keep up the good content!

[@borealbloomhomestead]

@@nathanziegman9262 cold climates make it really hard to keep animals for sure!

[@angelarasmussen1800]

Are you familiar with the Chantecler breed? They seem perfect for cold weather thriving.

[@borealbloomhomestead]

I have heard of them but they aren’t very common around these parts!

[@angelarasmussen1800]

@@borealbloomhomestead yeah, you would have to special order them.

[@craft-fun-tastic5983]

What do you put in the dust bath thank you for showing us your coop looking awesome

[@borealbloomhomestead]

Hey! It's outside of the coop in the "lean-to" you can see it kinda around the 12 minute mark!

[@craft-fun-tastic5983]

@@borealbloomhomestead Hi, I was talking basically about the recipe. What do you put in it thank you

[@borealbloomhomestead]

@@craft-fun-tastic5983 oh my so sorry! I use sand, wood ash, and top soil

[@acadianabroadfrenette420]

Thank you for info, where do you purchase your hemp bedding in Alberta?

[@borealbloomhomestead]

A local farm and feed store stocks it!

[@acadianabroadfrenette420]

What store I live in nothern Alberta also, I would like to buy some, they have some at peavy mart but only small and expensive bails lol

[@spymaine89]

very rude to take their eggs, i let then sit on for a few days then i take them.

[@borealbloomhomestead]

Happy to hear that works for you! We have to collect eggs regularly or else they freeze up here in Northern Alberta. Our hens aren't broody and they prefer to spend most of their day outside, so nobody is keeping the eggs warm LOL

[@NonaMaryGrace1952]

We love our automatic door. We have ours set on the time setting. 💕NonnaGrace 🐓