Maybe you got your chicks in the spring and raised them with tender loving care. Or maybe you’re like me and got pullets or adults hens that were already laying. You fooled yourself in the spring and summer, thinking this chicken thing was EASY, and then news flash! You need to prepare your chickens for winter!
I live in central Maryland, between Ft. Meade and Annapolis. So we get snow, ice, low temperatures, etc. Although usually lows are in the teens and twenties, and sometimes it gets colder than that.
Some of you may live in warmer areas (like Georgia, ahhhh…), or areas with what you call “REAL winter”, so I would love to hear your take on this in the comments! You never know who will get great advice 🙂
“Winter is coming”, So How Do I Get My Chickens Ready?
For me, it was when fall stopped feeling warm. The coop needed to be closed up earlier and earlier. I had to buy a headlamp to use in the morning because the sun was no longer rising early enough for me to open the coop and set out food before work in the morning.
Flickers of concern started tickling my mind, but I pushed them aside. I did do a little research though, thinking of our usual temperatures. Experienced chicken owners listed their top two concerns as coop ventilation and insulation.
1. Coop Ventilation
It seems counterintuitive that ventilation would be vital in the winter. We can totally understand it in the summer when it can get humid and hot. Who wants to be in a stuffy coop without air circulation? However, chickens exhale a lot of moisture, and cold air makes it more likely they will get respiratory illnesses or frostbite. What does good winter coop ventilation look like though? It can be something as easy as this:
2. Coop Insulation
A top question you’ll see on chicken forums: “How should I insulate my chicken coop?” Really the question is should you insulate your coop? Chicken’s body temperature usually hovers around 105 degrees Fahrenheit! Much warmer than people, so when they are enclosed in their coops, they generate a lot of body heat that keeps them warm.
How cold is too cold though? Don’t forget that people in places like North Dakota and Montana keep chickens, and they get sub-zero temperatures and copious amounts of snow every winter. Much worse than what I typically get in Maryland (thank goodness….).
I didn’t do anything to the coop except stuff some straw underneath it and put extra bedding inside. Based on my reading, extended temperatures of -10 Fahrenheit put your chickens at higher risk for severe frostbite, but otherwise, most cold hardy chickens will be fine.
The straw in the picture above was purchased to help cut the wind drafts under the bottom of the coop. It had an added bonus though: the chickens came out of the coop! Apparently, their Majesties didn’t like their feet on the cold dirt, so they were staying in the coop. If you use a rake, you can go through after a snowfall and shake the snow off the straw giving the ladies somewhere to walk.
What Should I Do for My Chickens? It Just Got Really Cold!
It’s alright. I did it too. I didn’t adequately prepare the coop for winter. All the stuff I have typed here, I learned during my panic when our real feel temperature was 5 degrees. DURING THE DAY. I wanted to bring the chickens into the basement, but I wasn’t allowed. So instead, research assuaged my fears. I have a lot more confidence now too!
3. Freezing Waterers
Frozen chicken waters annoyed me the most probably. What I may do next time is pop some of the reusable hand warmers into the waterer’s basin to keep that from freezing. The water in the tray is almost always going to freeze though. If your waterer is big enough, you may be able to put golf balls in the tray. The chickens push the golf balls around as they get water, keeping it from sitting still long enough to freeze.
Of course, if their majesties refuse to come out of the coop for water unless they are accompanied, then you’ll just need to bring out warm water to melt the water in the tray…..
4. Chicken Mash
Chicken mash was one of the easiest things I could do for the ladies that they seemed to really like. I took my regular organic chicken pellets and mixed them with some hot water. I put some quinoa that we were never going to eat in the mix as well, and the chickens seemed to really enjoy it! Easy peasy!
Before a chicken can digest its food, it has to moisten it first. Providing chicken mash for the hens kind of helps remove that step, and helps ensure they are getting more water. Especially since they didn’t want to come out and drink it unless I was standing right there.
5. Frostbite
Frostbite strikes during cold weather, true, but your hens are more at risk when their coop isn’t properly ventilated. Moisture gathers on their combs and wattles, making those areas vulnerable to frostbite injury. Good news though, minor frostbite is something chickens will recover from, so no need to dial 9-1-1!
Are You Serving Chicken for Dinner? The Predators Will Come A-knockin!
6. First Winter? Summer Secure vs. Winter Secure
This was my worst mistake raising hens so far. I thought my summer secure chicken pen was fine for the winter. Big surprise, it wasn’t. You can read about the chicken I lost to a raccoon here. The predators stayed away from the chickens during the warmer months, and that caused a false sense of comfort.
When you go out to see your chickens, you should check your coop, run, and pen every day. You may find signs of the predators in your area testing your coop defenses. Oftentimes though, our first sign of weak defenses is a dead or missing hen.
In the summer, prey is plentiful. During the winter, predators become desperate and do things they normally wouldn’t. Hunger is a powerful motivator. There are various signs you can use to try and identify a chicken predator, but sometimes you’ll never know.
How Do You Prepare Your Chickens For Winter?
Winter isn’t over for me yet, so I’m sure Mother Nature will teach me a couple more lessons before she’s through. These are my top tips so far to help prepare your chickens for the winter.
Any tips you would like to share? Put them in the comment box below! I respond to every one!
I use two hacks for my chickens’ waterers: I fill an empty water or soda bottle (16-20 oz) with salt water – this takes a LOT of salt, like 1/2 cup, so don’t skimp on it, pour it in with a funnel and fill almost the rest of the way with hot water. Put the top back on and shake to dissolve the salt. I have a 3-gallon waterer and a 7-gallon waterer for my chickens and ducks, and I put the bottle in the water reservoir. The salt water will keep the water from freezing as long as you keep enough water in the reservoir. If it gets too low the water will freeze. When that happens, or when the temperature gets really low, I use a black rubber feed pan to hold water. It has to be filled several times a day, but it can handle being dumped over and even stomped on to get the ice out when I refill it.
That is great to know! Those rubber feeders are super cheap too! I’ll buy a couple more!
I also insulated my coop with straw. To keep the water from freezing, we put a seedling heat mat under the water and it hasn’t frozen once. Luckily, haven’t dealt with predators yet…knock on wood.
That’s interesting! I hadn’t considered a seedling mat at all! I haven’t read that suggestion anywhere!
I use a heated dog bowl to have water available!
Those have to be plugged in right?
We don’t get cold enough here to do anything fancy for our chickens! The most we had to do was make sure they have somewhere to get out of the constant rain we get for a few weeks running.
Wow! I wish! I spent a lot of time standing there just so they would come out and drink some water!
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