Chickens Every Day
Dedicated to helping backyard chicken owners keep the happiest and healthiest flocks we can.
Chickens Every Day
Keeping Chickens Cozy: Winter Care Essentials & Tips
The episode focuses on essential winter care strategies for chickens, explaining how to keep them healthy and comfortable in cold weather. Key topics include the importance of cleaning the coop, managing moisture and drafts, and dietary adjustments during the colder months.
• Understanding winter hardiness among different chicken breeds
• Explanation of the deep litter method and its benefits
• Importance of cleaning the coop before winter
• Managing potential drafts and ensuring proper ventilation
• Discussing the impact of moisture and ammonia on chicken health
• Dietary changes needed during molting season
• Protecting chickens from frostbite and signs to watch for
• Cautions about using supplemental heat in the coop
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Speaker 2:Are we ready, pawpaw? Hello friends and welcome to Chicken. Every Day, a podcast for you, the backyard chicken enthusiasts, and mine. Your host is my Pawpaw, gary, gary Valerie of Senla Backyard Chickens. Here we have fun while sharing ideas and learning how to care for our foul feathered friends. Check out our videos at CENLA. That's C-E-N-L-A Backyard Chickens on YouTube, tiktok and Facebook. So, without further ado, let's start today's show. How was that?
Speaker 1:Hey everyone. Gary, with CENLA Backyard Chickens here and winter is upon us and for some of you, winter's been here for a few weeks now Got some pictures from my cousin who lives in Alaska the other day and they are snowed in. It is very deep. So what we want to talk about now is how do I get my chickens through the winter. There's a lot of videos out there that you guys can see on YouTube, but really it's a fairly simple thing.
Speaker 1:Chickens, by and large, are a very winter hardy breed of birds. They're very fluffy. This fluff that they have is what helps keep them warm. So you know, generally it's not not a worrisome thing that you want to do. I'd usually recommend not to put supplemental heat inside a chicken coop. Now there's, of course, reasons why you may want supplemental heat inside your coop. If you have older chickens, if you have small chickens, if you have those turkey neck necky neck chickens may require some supplemental heat. So what your situation may be may be different from the next guy's situation. If you're under an extreme cold snap and you have, you know, five degree weather that's going to be there for a week, you may want to think about it. But by and large chickens do not need supplemental heat, but what they do need are a few good basic things.
Speaker 1:Now, first thing you want to think about is am I doing deep litter in my chicken coop or do I need to clean it out? If you don't know what deep litter method is, it's basically you take your shavings or whatever you have for the lining in the bed of your coop and you just kind of stir it up as the chickens defecate on it and you add another layer on top of that. What this does? It composts over time. You just keep adding layers, mix it up, add a layer, wait a while, do the same thing and it builds up and it composts over time. The microbes that are in this compost are the good guys. They're not going to do anything detrimental to your chicken. In fact, deep litter helps get rid of mites and lice. They don't like to live in that environment, so that's kind of a plus to that. So if you're going to deep litter, know that that also generates a little bit of heat. Just the act of composting generates heat.
Speaker 1:If you don't do compost now, it's the time to clean out your coop. You want a good winter. Clean, you get everything nice and clean for those birds before you start the winter out, so that they have that good, fresh foot going forward, so to speak. The next thing you want to think about is drafts. You do not want any drafts in your coop. The wind starts blowing and it's cold. You don't want that cold air hitting your birds in there. However, you do need ventilation at the top of the coop because ammonia and moisture can build up and that's the true enemy that you have during the wintertime.
Speaker 1:Moisture can bring on illness, it can bring on stress, it can make your birds uncomfortable. Moisture is a big deal in the wintertime and the fact is summers are generally harder on birds than they are winters. But you have to remember in the wintertime there's fewer daylight hours. Your birds spend more time in the coop in the winter than they do in the summer. So we need a good, clean coop. We need to have moisture control in there. We need to have ammonia control in there. You'll see, like in my coop, how I try to seal up any drafts that I may have in it, and you also know that right now is molting season. As the birds get ready for winter, they're gonna start dropping feathers, getting ready to put on some new feathers. So a little extra protein in their diet makes a big difference for them.
Speaker 1:I like to give my birds a snack in the afternoon times or the late evenings before they go to bed, especially if it's going to be cold that night. Now a lot of people like to use cracked corn and I like to use that too and they say, well, the corn heats up their bodies. Well, that's really not the actual case. Corn has a lot of carbohydrates. The carbohydrates require a lot of energy and they produce a lot of energy so that in fact gives them more heat through their systems. Athletes, you know, boxers and runners and all these kind of folks they will eat cars before they go out and do a physical activity because it energizes and stresses up your bodies, and spaghetti is a good one for that. But I don't really feed my chickens spaghetti, so usually cracked corn in the evenings is usually suffice for that.
Speaker 1:You want to think about protecting those birds against frostbite. You have the big tall cones on some of the birds. A lot of people put Vaseline on there, especially if it's going to get down in the teens or lower than that, to protect your birds against frostbite. Other than that. Take care of your animals. Look after them every day. Make sure that you don't see any signs of stress going on, no signs of frostbite. You double check that your draft control is doing what it should. You see when you go in your coop you don't have those strong ammonia odors in there. Do your part so that come springtime chick season, chick seasons here you're going to be happy and ready to get those baby chicks. You're going to have happy and healthy young birds taking care of your birds throughout the winter.
Speaker 1:It's not all that difficult, but it does require some attention. If you're in really, really cold climates, you got to think about freezing water. So if you have a water warmer, that that helps right there. Or you can just go out there every day, break through the ice, put new, fresh water in. Obviously, we could do a deep dive on this subject. That would last over an hour. But you know and get the gist of this take care of your animals the best way that you know that you can.
Speaker 1:I do want to caution you on one thing before I close out today If you decide to put supplemental heat in your coop, be careful about that If your birds get overly dependent on having that and you lose power for several days during a heavy cold snap. Their bodies are not used to handling this and it can really be detrimental and you could probably lose some animals if you did that. So really be careful before you think about using supplemental heat. Give this some long, serious thought If you need to absolutely do it.
Speaker 1:If you use a heat lamp, take extra, extra and then extra precautions again on the heat lamp, make sure that it is tied up out of the way, completely secured, and it's not going to fall and get on any ashes or wood chips or anything that can cause a fire, because every year somebody ends up losing their chickens because of fire or that. So if you're gonna use a heat lamp and I use a heat lamp I don't have an issue with them. I'm pretty good with electrical items but make sure it is extra secure to do that. But chick season's gonna be here before you know it. Make sure you birds stay strong, healthy and happy going through winter and we'll chat with you soon. Bye.
Speaker 2:That's all we have time for today. I really hope you enjoyed listening to the podcast. Be sure to watch our videos. So, on behalf of my pup, gary, and me, sylvie, thanks for listening.
