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Ventilation vs. Draftiness


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Double D
208 posts
May 10, 2006
9:27 PM
My loft I'm building is 16' long by 8' wide with kit boxes connected to the front so that I can feed and water the kit boxes from inside the loft. I'm not exactly sure how to go about providing excellent ventilation in this loft vs. just having it be drafty. In other words, where should vents be located? Should I employ an electric fan blowing air out of the ceiling and sucking it from vents located new the floor? Are vents at each end of the loft on the 8' walls good enough or do I need vents in every wall. Should the vents be up higher or near the floor. I live in Idaho so it gets cold and snowy in the winter so I want to keep the birds out of the weather in the wintertime so I won't do window-like holes in the walls covered in chicken wire. I don't want it that open. I want the loft to be able to retain at least some heat so I can start breeding in late January - early February. I want to keep the loft property ventilated while also keeping it as enclosed as possible. In the summer of course, it gets hot. What are some of your opinions on providing the best ventilation or the proper ventilation for a loft this size given my climate? How to provide the ventilation? If with covered vents, locations of where they should be placed? Electric fan usage? If so, location of it? Thanks!

Darin
MCCORMICKLOFTS
512 posts
May 10, 2006
11:34 PM
That is the same size as my kit box loft (see photos below), only difference as you described yours is that my boxes are on the inside. The exterior doors have a wire opening while the interior kit box doors are all wire. I vented the bottom of the front wall and back wall as well as left the joist gaps open on the front and back to further allow air to move through. The back wall has two 2x2 windows. In the middle of the roof is a wind driven roof vent and on the far wall is an electric fan fixed to a timer. My loft faces the west which is where our breeze comes from. The breeze blows right through the doors and out the back side. I doubt my fan does much except when the air is calm. In the afternoons you can really feel the air moving through the loft. During the summer it actually stays very cool inside, even on 110 degree days. Of course I don't live in as cold of a climate as you, but I would say that having wire windows will be a plus for you. You can always just plastic them up during the winter. The electric fan will help greatly during the winter as far as dust goes, but it won't help for keeping heat in. The bird don't need that much heat anyways. If you are going to use two, have one on one wall that is pushing air in while the other opposite it is pulling air out.
Air moving through is a good thing. I always wondered if my birds might get sick from the air moving through but I never have a problem at all with sickness in the kit boxes.
Brian.



Last Edited by MCCORMICKLOFTS on May 10, 2006 11:36 PM
AIREDALE
1 post
May 11, 2006
9:39 AM
Great Loft Photos. Clean, Airey and Functional.A picture is worth a thousand words.
Ballrollers
351 posts
May 11, 2006
10:49 AM
Brian,
Nice loft and photos! Those shots look like the loft is fairly new. So I take it the crap falls through the wire and then you rake or shovel the floor from the inside? Or do you plan to use drawers under each kitbox? I'm getting ready to build a breeder loft and I was thinking along similar lines as this, planning a solid wall from the floor up to the front of the kit box (or breeding pen) leaving a large wire door on the outside, in about the same location as your floor vents, to access the floor for raking and scraping manure from the outside, so I can stay in the fresh air. The idea is to keep the bloom and dust away from the interior for the birds sake and nearer the exterior for mine. What do you think? Cliff

Last Edited by Ballrollers on May 11, 2006 10:51 AM
MCCORMICKLOFTS
513 posts
May 11, 2006
1:22 PM
Thanks Cliff. Yes these photos were taken last year after I had just sort of completed it. It has more ergonomic features in it now like a sink, show pens, etc.
There are drawers under the kit boxes which you really can't see in these images. I made trap doors on the front under the exterior doors which the drawers slide out of and are cleaned on the outside of the loft. The height is actually perfect as the drawers have a six inch wide center gap that I scrap the crap down to and then into a trash can. This allows me to not have to fully remove the trays. It works well to when I let the kit birds bath. After they are done I simply pull the drawers out and let them hang at an angle and whatever water is in them simply runs out and the drawers dries out really fast. Then they are pushed back in and that is that. This keeps all of the crap out of the loft itself.
One thing to note is to make sure and run your floor ventilation across to each corner. Most of the bloom will build up in the corners so having good ventilation at those points will greatly reduce the feather bloom. Believe it or not, just about each morning, especially with all the young bird kits now, I use a small leaf blower and blow out the loft which really keeps the air clean inside.
nicksiders
572 posts
May 11, 2006
1:26 PM
Brian,

Are you the carpenter for all of this...........great set up. I am envious....LOL
Double D
210 posts
May 11, 2006
7:15 PM
Extremely nice Brian!!! Thanks for the pics! I love pics as you can really see what's going on. Nice Kit Boxes! You've really got yours opened up from all sides. Let's here from others of you. Thanks!

Darin
Opinionated Blowhard
36 posts
May 11, 2006
10:36 PM
Make sure you have plenty of vents at the highest point of the roof. The air pigeons exhale is warmer and has more moisture, so it rises. Fresh or damp droppings fill the air in loft with ammonia vapors that can irritate pigeons respiratory system. Provide an exit for the warmest air at a place where wind blowing toward those exit vents wont blow down directly on the birds. If it might, consider some kind of baffle or partial solid ceiling with opening for air exit away from where the birds roost.

If you have big windows or many windows, floor vents are not as necessary. If you have floor vents, use some kind of vent cover so dogs-cats-racoons-children etc. can't disturb the birds in the loft. In very cold Idaho winter weather, you can put plastic or plexiglass over the windows and partially cover the entrance and exit vents. You can even use some kind of safe heater like an oil-filled electric radiant heater. Even if you cover the windows dont cover the vents entirely or humidity will build up in loft and birds will get sick.

Avoid drafts. A draft is a current of cool air blowing on a bird roosting in a warmer atmosphere. If there are many windows, the atmosphere inside the loft will not be warmer than the outside air and drafts will not be as likely. Think of yourself sitting in a warm house in the winter 2 ft from a window open 2" with another window open on the other side of house. Thats a draft and its uncomfortable. Now think of yourself sitting on the beach with ocean breezes blowing around and over you. Thats not a draft.

Sometimes a pigeon sitting in a draft can get one-eyed cold or other respiratory infection.

Pigeons need lots of oxygen. Always safer to have too much fresh air than not enough. The ideal is just right--not too much not too little. Kevin
Ballrollers
352 posts
May 14, 2006
12:23 PM
Brian, I would love to see a pic of those trap doors and the drawers from the outside if you can get around to it sometime. It sounds like an ideal set up! YITS, Cliff
MCCORMICKLOFTS
523 posts
May 14, 2006
5:43 PM
Cliff, this is a shot I took while the loft was still under construction but it shows how the trays slide in from the front and ride on tracks under the wire of the kit box. The bottom of the tray sits about three inches from the wire. One thing that I find important is the notch in the front of the tray. Not only does it make it easier to clean them out, but I leave the trap doors open so air can blow across the crap and keep it very dry all the time.
Brian.

Last Edited by MCCORMICKLOFTS on May 14, 2006 5:44 PM
Ballrollers
353 posts
May 15, 2006
8:12 AM
Very cool, Brian. Great ideas! One thing there is no shortage of in this sport and that is the ingenuity of its men! So did you paint the OSB board exteriorly with anything special or is that a siding? And don't you have problems with the OSB doors warping with time? (Sorry about all the questions, but I'm admiring your work!!)
YITS, Cliff

Last Edited by Ballrollers on May 15, 2006 8:15 AM
MCCORMICKLOFTS
527 posts
May 15, 2006
1:49 PM
Cliff, the doors are framed with 2x4s so they won't warp. The entire thing is pretty much heavily framed with 2x4s so warping shouldn't be an issue, but time will tell. The only reason I used the OSB was because a friend of mine is a construction contractor and he had 27 sheets left over from a job and gave it to me. I couldn't have afforded to build this thing if it wasn't for the free sheet wood. I painted it with seven coats of paint spread out over about two weeks time. We don't get the kind of rain you guys do so it shouldn't be a problem. If it ever did become an issue, say 5-10 years from now, the way I built it, I could remove the OSB siding in a day and replace it with T-111.
Ballrollers
354 posts
May 15, 2006
2:43 PM
Now that's the way to build a loft...with products you can get cheap or for free! Thanks for bearing with me, Brian. Hope you don't mind if I use some of your ideas!
YITS, Cliff
MCCORMICKLOFTS
528 posts
May 15, 2006
2:47 PM
Have at it Cliff. I borrowed the original idea after spending a few days at Scotts house and enjoying his nice kit box loft set up.
Brian.
fhtfire
441 posts
May 15, 2006
4:37 PM
Hey Brian,

Take it to the next level and add a swing set and a slide!!!! Now that is a loft...Hell my loft is even used as a diving board...my teenage son..dives from the roof of the breeder loft/play set into the pool!

rock and ROLL

Paul
nicksiders
592 posts
May 15, 2006
11:59 PM
Paul ain't kidding either...........hell I couldn't figure out where his loft was for several minutes. It is camoflauged in a backyard play area. But, his birds know exactly where it is.


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