Tending Livestock in [Freezing] Winter

[tortoise]

can't you stack some hay bales to create a wind-break and another layer of insulation around a chicken coop to keep more of the heat in?

i'd think that for birds as long as they are dry and out of the wind they can pretty much cope with a lot more than we can.

I have a rat problem under my coop. Yikes. Otherwise, straw bales around would probably help a lot to keep the wind from drawing warmth away from the coop floor.

 

[Britesea]

I can't help thinking about 76 year old Agafia, the woman that lives alone in Siberia, going out every morning to chop a hole in the ice on the river to get buckets of water for herself and her livestock. Grateful to be living where I do. We usually fill a bucket with hot water once or twice a day from the inside sink for the chickens.

 

[Trying2keepitReal]

can't you stack some hay bales to create a wind-break and another layer of insulation around a chicken coop to keep more of the heat in?

i'd think that for birds as long as they are dry and out of the wind they can pretty much cope with a lot more than we can.

I think that a wind-break is a definite need for many animals but yes for chickens. we plastic up our run in the winter which makes it like an unheated greenhouse-but they seem to like it so far.

 

[Trying2keepitReal]

I have a rat problem under my coop. Yikes. Otherwise, straw bales around would probably help a lot to keep the wind from drawing warmth away from the coop floor.

yuck on the rats--from what I hear they are hard to get rid of. Can you set some traps and then close up underneath to coop? hopefully they haven't made it into the coop...*shudder*

 

[tortoise]

yuck on the rats--from what I hear they are hard to get rid of. Can you set some traps and then close up underneath to coop? hopefully they haven't made it into the coop...*shudder*

We starved them out by moving chickens out for years. DH filled their burrows with water to chase them out. He poisoned them (and we are very anti-poison around here!). Couple months after having chickens in the coop, they returned. They chew through the exterior walls of the coop. I asked DH if he would line the coop with leftover metal siding. I don't think there's enough left to completely exclude rats, but anything helps

 

[Hinotori]

We have less rats in winter only because the pretty much surface water table gives them less places to escape the wrath of the dogs and silkies.

Poor Athena yesterday. She wanted me to tilt one of the little silkie houses to get a rat. She grabbed it and pulled it out. It was screaming and she needed to readjust her bite to kill it. She got a face full of yelling silkies as they came running to get the rat. She let the rat go rather than accidentally harm one of the chickens. So she's a good dog. She pouted for a while after that. German shepherds don't seem to have the instinct to shake what they catch.

 

[Alaskan]

Freezing temps make animal care chores more challenging. How do you manage?

We bring out water 2x to 3x a day.

Only when it freezes solid too quickly do we plug in the electric heater, a stock tank de-icer.


When we had horses we would run a hose (3 lengths, about 150 feet of hose) from the upstairs house faucet to the barn. We would turn the water onto super hot and fill their water trough. There was a heating element in the bottom of the water trough, and we had it boxed up, insulated, and half the top covered.

When we had more poultry we would consolidate them as much as possible for winter.

We now have 2 winter coops.

We designed the coops so we don't have to do any snow shoveling.


I don't heat the coops. I once, many years back had a heat lamp in the winter. I went into the coop and the gust of cold air that came in with me made the heat lamp shatter all through the bedding.

Never again heat lamps in winter, too dangerous.

When we had goats we had a warm-up box for new kids. That was a heating pad duct taped into a freezer ziplock in a cardboard box.

 

[Trying2keepitReal]

I don't heat the coops. I once, many years back had a heat lamp in the winter. I went into the coop and the gust of cold air that came in with me made the heat lamp shatter all through the bedding.

Never again heat lamps in winter, too dangerous.

this happened to my uncle too. We had a local farmer that had a fire from a heat lamp about 5 years ago too and lost all the poultry in the barn.

 

[flowerbug]

as something more like a heat lump instead of a heat lamp you could take a submerged aquarium heater of the appropriate wattage (don't set it too hot to boil the water) and put it in a bucket with a tight lid (also making sure that the heater won't melt the bucket). if you use a pretty heavy duty cord and make sure the connections are well wrapped with tape to keep the gunk out then this might last for several years.

 

[Alaskan]

I always worry about using an aquarium heater...

1. They bust if they are run dry
2. They tend to keep the water at pretty warm temps, warmer than you need, so wasting electricity

A bird bath de-icer or stock tank de-icer is usually safer and uses less electricity.