bigwilly
9 posts
Oct 11, 2007
10:18 PM
|
Hello friends. I wanted to ask if any of you guys breed during the winter time? Also, what do you thinh about feeding the birds safflower? I heard that it was good for the feathers.
|
Santandercol
1486 posts
Oct 11, 2007
10:43 PM
|
Hey Willy,
Depends how cold it is where you live.Most parts of the US and Canada it's to0 cold to start breeding before February-March but on the westcoast its not so bad.I put my pairs together last year on December 20th and never lost a bird to the cold.
Safflower seed is good in a mixed feed as it is quite oily and helps them through the moult.
----------
Kelly
|
bigwilly
10 posts
Oct 12, 2007
7:18 AM
|
Santandercol thanks alot for your reply. I live on the West Coast in Sacramento Ca. I plan on keeping my breeders paired up the whole winter. I have been having a problem with predatores wiping me out. I am not getting mad just trying to figure out how to work through this problem.
|
Tony Chavarria
Site Publisher
1705 posts
Oct 12, 2007
9:11 AM
|
Hey Willis, I breed through the winter and last year it got down to single digits, lost no squabs due to cold. I insulated my loft and have a couple of heaters and fans to circulate the warm air.
Like the Bahamas in there during winter. All the kit birds stay in the cold kit boxes and dream about making it to the breeder loft! LOL
During winter, I like to keep the temps NO LESS than 60 degrees, closer to 70 means I get to warm up in the breeding loft while I work with the birds.
----------
FLY ON! Tony Chavarria
|
splitter
26 posts
Oct 12, 2007
3:56 PM
|
Tony, With the loft insulated, how do you get rid of the dust. I have a exhuast fan and it would pull out the the hot air with the dust.
----------
Tall Pine Lofts
|
Tony Chavarria
Site Publisher
1710 posts
Oct 12, 2007
5:29 PM
|
Hey Chris, well for starters, I find that without good air-exchange, the breeder birds will eventually stress breathing stale dusty air, so the exhaust fan stays on almost 24/7.
The exhaust fan blows the air out at the top end of the west side of the loft and an in-take grill allows fresh air to constantly be sucked in on the east side.
I also employ a blower fan that keeps the air moving around the loft, it too is always on. The dust is kicked up and then blown out of the exhaust fan. It amazing how this constant cycling keeps the dust way down.
The only downside to heating the loft during cold Fall and Winter days is that heat is blown out too. But since the blower fan is on, the heat is evenly spread out throughout the loft, even though some is blown out.
Maybe I could install a filtering system that would filter the air but force the heated air back into the loft?? But I still need fresh air piped in, probably wouldn't work.
Anyone have any ideas to solve this??
Other than the lost heat, the air exchanging works really well.
----------
FLY ON! Tony Chavarria
|