What are your experiences with winter poultry losses?

I am sitting here watching it snow and thinking about the long, hard winter that is being forecast. Ugh! I lost three birds in late fall and winter last year - one to Marek's, one to a broken back from some over zealous roosters (I think), and another one to, I think, an egg breaking inside her - she was young but lay a monster egg that was always a double yolker.

This year my girls will get the winter off as we now have our "Monastery" built for the roos.

What are your experiences with winter losses in your chickens, etc? What do you think the reasons were? Any advice for minimizing winter losses?

The only losses are from my Fayoumi rooster killing other roosters smaller then him (Bantams now have there own small pen).My Fayoumis hate being penned up and i have to buy them toys and blocks of suet to keep them busy

I always used to have some sickness go through and kill some birds each winter. Last year I only lost two birds and one might have just been old age. I credit the vapona strip that I was trying for the first time. I think the birds did a lot better because they weren't stressed with mites or lice.

I just put new No Pest strips in too, hoping to keep the lice and mites away! Do you keep a window open for ventilation with the Vapona strip? I have never used it before in winter.

No but my henhouse isn't so airtight that I would be very concerned anyway.

When I had the water inside the hen house and the windows shut to keep the heat in, I also had inside moisture problems. I had more cases of sniffles and sneezes. Now the water ans food stay OUTSIDE no matter what the weather and a window is always cracked, for air circulation. They seem to do better when it is not so humid inside.

I keep a no pest strip all year round and replace it when I see pests. I usually buy one a year. Keep the dust blown off it.

Uno's right, much better with no water inside.

I do cave on food though - otherwise I get mice and little birds eating it all outside when the birds are locked inside. So I have two feeders, one in and one out (emptied at night), and just rubber tubs for water only outside. Every cold morning I kick out the ice and add new water from the hauled barrel. Better than any alternatives for me.

I do keep windows and air vents open all year except when below -25C and the wind is out of the north, then all but one air vent (25 by 10 cm) are closed.

I rarely have winter losses apart from

1. very old birds
2. silkies - they just seem to fall over at about 2 years old
3. guinea fowl - they curl up and die in the cold sometimes

For some reason I haven't seen any sign of lice or mites. But then we also are flea free on pets - just too cold and remote?

I keep heat lamps over the waterers, but I keep the windows and chickens entries open all the time. Predators have not been a problem. I have had the occasional death with chickens flying into hanging heat lamps, and feeders. Molting can attract peaking which has caused some loses among weaker members of the flock. This seem to be a bigger problem when we had White Wyandottes.

heda gobbler wrote:Uno's right, much better with no water inside.

I do cave on food though - otherwise I get mice and little birds eating it all outside when the birds are locked inside. So I have two feeders, one in and one out (emptied at night), and just rubber tubs for water only outside. Every cold morning I kick out the ice and add new water from the hauled barrel. Better than any alternatives for me.

I do keep windows and air vents open all year except when below -25C and the wind is out of the north, then all but one air vent (25 by 10 cm) are closed.

I rarely have winter losses apart from

1. very old birds
2. silkies - they just seem to fall over at about 2 years old
3. guinea fowl - they curl up and die in the cold sometimes

For some reason I haven't seen any sign of lice or mites. But then we also are flea free on pets - just too cold and remote?

I worm with Ivomec after locking them up that looks after pests, I also add Diatom powder to nest boxes and under bedding as well as vapona no pest strips, for mice Rodent odor free never a mouse again.