How to insulate a chicken coop for the winter with your own hands? Practical tips

It is quite easy to erect a chicken coop and settle a bird into it, these stages are just the beginning of achieving a positive result. In order for layers to supply eggs to you all year round, care should be taken so that in winter the temperature in the henhouse does not fall below 0 ° С. Poultry farmers in this case resort to thermal insulation of the premises. Such works can be carried out in four directions, among them:

• Heating of the room;
• Wall insulation;
• Litter device;
• Thermal insulation of the ceiling.

Warming the floor with straw

If you are faced with the question of how to insulate the chicken coop for the winter with your own hands, it is first necessary to take care of the lower part of the premises. For this, a litter is used, it can be deep or shallow. The correct content of poultry provides for the application of the first option. In deep litter, the temperature can vary between +25 ... +28 ° C. In the role of material for this, moss peat, straw, shavings or sawdust are used. The latter option is created from three parts of the shavings and part of the sawdust. The best way for this is sawdust of coniferous trees. They differ in disinfecting properties, among other things, they do not cake up and perfectly pass moisture.

When constructing the floor from sawdust and shavings, do not let the bird in if there is no food in the feeders. This is due to the fact that the litter can be eaten by birds. Over it should be laid a small straw. In spring, the materials used to create the litter can be used as a fertilizer. Thinking about the question of how to insulate the coop for the winter with your own hands, you can pay attention to the cutting of grass or straw, which has excellent thermal insulation qualities. The thickness of this layer can reach a limit of 3 to 5 cm. When choosing a similar material, you should prefer one that has a shiny surface, it is better to refuse from the moldy insulation.

In addition to litter

The most suitable variant for litter is moss peat, it absorbs the droppings of birds and moisture, eliminating unpleasant odor, and also drying chicken legs, so the bird is not sick. If peat is mixed with dung, it will become an excellent fertilizer for the infield. When you are faced with the question of how to insulate the chicken coop for the winter with your own hands, you should lay a deep litter, the layer of which is 20 cm or less. The new material should be laid in a layer of up to 10 cm, it must be done with the floor contamination. Litter should periodically loosen and mix.

Work on the walls

As a rule, for the breeding of birds used rooms, the walls of which are made of softwood. For severe climatic conditions it is best to use a log cabin. If the chicken coop is installed in an area where the climate is mild, you can use inch boards. You can seal up the cracks with the help of a tow or a moss. In order that the chickens do not eat the warming layer, it should be sewed with wooden slats. Thermal insulation from the outside is carried out by the method of fixing foam plates, which are covered by a flat slate.

You can use the option that involves the creation of walls by the method of laying two rows of boards, in this case, they should be laid between the insulation material. As a thermal insulation, you can use dry leaves and wooden sawdust, as well as fallen needles of coniferous trees. Before insulating the henhouse for the winter with your own hands, it is necessary to mix the thermal insulation material with lime. In this case, a certain proportion should be used: part of lime and 25 parts of thermal insulation. Lay material that was obtained by mixing two ingredients, it is necessary to tamping.

If you are faced with the question of how to insulate the chicken coop for the winter with your own hands, then you can consider an option that involves the use of shingles. This technology is the most common. For its implementation, the walls must be covered with the material laid in two layers. Excellent thermal insulation qualities can be achieved when the shingle is plastered from above. The mixture must be made of clay, to which is added a certain amount of sawdust. The latter should be added to wet clay. The resulting composition is well mixed until a uniform mass can be obtained.

Recommendations for the treatment of walls

As soon as the solution from clay is infused, which takes about 3 hours, it can be applied to the surface of the walls, while a 3-cm layer should be formed. If you are thinking about how to insulate the chicken coop for the winter with your own hands, then you can use the technology described above, it requires the walls to dry until they dry completely. The cracks that appear should be filled with clay mortar, 2 parts of fine sand are added to the clay part for its preparation. The walls dry out, and after they can be processed with quicklime. In conclusion, their surface is hammered by inexpensive material, for this, glass fiber also perfectly suits. If we exclude this stage, then it is likely that the bird, if there is not enough calcium in the body, will peck the plastered wall.

Warming of doors and windows

After warming the walls in the henhouse for the winter with their own hands it was possible, you should take care of also the doors, as well as the windows, because it is through them that leaves a lot of heat. For normal lighting, only one window is sufficient, which is best located on the east or south side. It should have double removable frames, because in the summer it is better to change them to a grid. This method allows you to effectively ventilate the room.

Before the onset of winter cold, a polyethylene film can be fixed to the window. Warming of doors is best done with a dense thermal insulation material. To save on a heater it is not necessary, in fact through an aperture the maximum quantity of a cold arrives. Sometimes the insulation is done by carpet or an old carpet in addition to the main activities.

Warming of the ceiling

Now you know how to insulate the floor in the chicken coop for the winter with your own hands, but this will not be enough to make the bird feel comfortable. It is also important to take care of the ceiling. According to the laws of physics, warm air will always rush to the top of the room. If there are cracks in the ceiling or roof, the heat will certainly go up.

Technology

Warming of the ceiling is divided into several stages, among them:

• Removal of decayed old boards;
• Treatment of new boards with antiseptic;
• Installation of boards on the walls;
• Installation of mineral wool;
• Covering the surface with a finishing coat.

Mineral cotton wool on both sides must be closed with a foil for vapor barrier insulation, this eliminates the dampening and weathering. Using the staples of the construction stapler, the heater must be attached to the underside of the beams. Finishing can be a wooden paneling, with its help it will be possible to form a ceiling without cracks. Fixation of the lining is carried out by metal clamps. The first rake should be located near the wall, all the following are installed in the grooves of the previous ones.

Important to remember

If there is an attic in the henhouse, cotton wool can be spread over beams or from above. It will be sufficient to have a layer of 10 cm, cotton wool is covered with a vapor barrier and fixed by a beam overlap with a stapler. Clapboard should be painted, and after drying the paint, lighting fixtures are attached to it.

Warming of walls with sawdust

Quite often, modern poultry farmers are wondering how to insulate the chicken coop for the winter with their own hands. The choice of material today may seem really complicated, but some experts still use proven methods, among them one can distinguish the same sawdust with which the ceiling is insulated. This technology allows you to save on construction materials. First of all, it is necessary to ensure fire safety, for this heating wiring, switches, chimneys and sockets, as well as other fire hazardous areas, must be protected with non-combustible material. Wiring must be placed in metal pipes, the wall thickness should be 3 mm or more.

Thermal insulation with sawdust can be carried out after the preparation of a special insulating mixture. To begin with, a frame is installed, and material will be poured into it. Having removed from the wall, it is necessary to install wooden slats on which the crate is stuffed. Once the walls are ready, it is necessary to take care of the presence of dry sawdust, they are sometimes replaced by small shavings. Before you insulate the chicken house for the winter (with your own hands), the material is important to choose. In the described case, this should be waste that results from the sawing or processing of wood. The fraction of thermal insulation should be relatively large.

Preparation

In addition to sawdust, you will need:

• water;
• Gypsum or cement;
• lime;
• Antiseptic.

As the latter, boric acid is most often used. For preparation, use 10 parts of sawdust, about 7 liters of water, part of gypsum and lime.

Carrying out work

Ingredients are mixed, and the amount of water you can control yourself by squeezing the solution. The lump must not crumble. During stirring the insulation is sprayed with an antiseptic. Once the thermal insulation is ready, it can be filled in the prepared frame to the level of the crate. The material is compacted well, so that in the future it does not sag.

Heat insulation of the attic with sawdust

They will help to find out how to insulate the chicken coop for the winter with their own hands, the advice of specialists. For example, experienced in this case, the masters say that the loft can be insulated and the attic, if any, should be in the henhouse. The surface for laying the thermal insulation layer should be prepared, for this purpose all the slots are covered with clay or filled with mounting foam.

If the attic has a chimney, then for fire safety around it, slag or any other non-combustible material must be laid. Then sawdust is prepared, the size of which will affect the density. The larger it is, the smaller this parameter will be. It is better to use fine sawdust. To prepare the mixture, it is necessary to take 85% of sawdust and 10% of lime-lint, 5% of gypsum is added to these materials. Sawdust is treated with an antiseptic and dried. In the pre-prepared container, all components are mixed, and then diluted with water.

They clearly demonstrate how to insulate the coop for the winter with their own hands, the photos used in the article. From them you can understand that the solution prepared according to the technology described above should be covered with a thick layer around the area of the attic, its thickness should be about 25 cm. The surface must be well compacted so that after drying the material does not turn out to be too porous and does not shrink. The process should be carried out as quickly as possible, as the gypsum dries quickly, during this time you may not be able to time it in time. If the attic is to be used, for example, to store inventory or feed, then after drying the solution from sawdust it must be covered with a wooden floor.

Conclusion

Now you know how to insulate the chicken house for the winter with your own hands straw and other materials. If the construction is capital, then the roof is equipped with rafters, on top of which it is necessary to lay the film. It not only preserves the layer of thermal insulation, but also eliminates the decay of wood. Fastening of waterproofing is carried out by staples of a construction stapler, as it can be used a dense polyethylene film. Well, the question of how to properly insulate the chicken coop for the winter with your own hands can be considered closed. Preliminary it is recommended to learn more about the qualities of some modern thermal insulation materials - perhaps you will discover new options.