I love my animals! Love them, except in winter, when I don’t. Then they go from movie star status to unsightly object on the bottom of my shoe type of admiration. Through no fault of their own of course. They are just as quirky and wonderful as they were in the summer when I’m happily spending all day outside admiring them, kissing my baby bunnies, or watching my chickens scratch around the yard. It’s just so, so cold in the winter! I don’t want to go out in -20° F to take care of animals but, I do it anyway. I might be sitting by the fire reading or slow cooking in the kitchen, my animals do not have this luxury. That is reality. Twice a day, every day, morning and night, animals need to be taken care of, especially in the winter.
All livestock animals have similar needs that must be met in order to successfully make it through the winter: food, shelter, water, and the ability to enact with their environment that is innate to each species. Below are the specifics winter requirements for the animals I have raised and overwintered on my homestead.
Rabbits
I always keep too many meat rabbits overwinter. My kids are sneaky and constantly undermine my attempts to get rid of rabbits before winter. Laying on their cuteness and lisping like crazy they say, “Mom, Sweety Bell is my most bestest rabbit, don’t eat him”, as they hug their current favorite. And then don’t you know it, I’m somehow overwintering five male rabbits! Oh well. So consequently I have 6-8 rabbits every winter. Now luckily for me rabbits actually overwinter pretty well. I don’t have a barn but I do have some super fancy hutches for them, you can read about them here and get the plans to build your own. Here’s the basic info on how to overwinter rabbits when the temperatures are below freezing.
Adequate Housing – Provide housing for your rabbits that block the wind, whether that is in a barn or a hutch with wood walls. Provide a nest box or a lot of hay for them to burrow into when the temperature gets below -15° F.
Water is Important – Give them water twice a day if their water freezes quickly. I use small metal bowls about a measuring cup in size that I can knock the ice out of. They will quickly learn to drink the water immediately when it is offered. I also leave a small block of ice in their cages so they can nibble on it in the middle of the day.
Clean Cages – If the temperature rises up to 20° F, clean their cages! I’m not joking. Two months of frozen poo is not fun for anyone and it is impossible to clean below 20°. I use a beehive tool, a hammer, and a hand trowel to clean mine with.
Teeth and Nail Care – Rabbits teeth will continue to grow through their lives, make sure there is a piece of wood for the rabbits to chew on, I use small a piece of firewood with the bark still attached. Also if your rabbits have not been out digging due to frozen or snowy ground, clip their nails about once a month, especially for species like Rexes.
That’s really it.
For more info on raising meat rabbits in general click here.
Turkeys
These guys are super easy to overwinter. At least the heritage breeds are. I don’t know anything about overwintering broad-breasted, I always butcher mine before winter. But heritage breeds are hands-down the easiest animal on my homestead to take care of. They’re machines, they don’t drink any water as far as I can tell, they eat a bit of food, and wind, snow, and extreme temperatures do not bother them at all. They don’t even need special housing. Woohooo! So here are two ways I’ve overwintered my turkeys very successfully.
With the Chickens – Throw them in with the chickens and follow the ‘chickens’ instructions below. This works well because you only have one light set up, one building, you only have to water and feed one set up animals. I never had any problems with disease crossing between chickens and turkeys. Since turkeys require more protein than chickens I throw handfuls of small black oil sunflower seeds to everyone every morning in addition to chicken feed that is always there. There are two downsides to this method. First, I think my turkeys squished a couple of hens, but I can’t prove it, when they flew off the perch in the morning. But the chickens quickly learned to scatter when the turkeys were coming down and that stopped being an issue. Two, come spring, my testosterone happy tom chased my rooster into a tree and wouldn’t let him come down. So I moved my turkeys to their own pen. Before that, they got along fine. Oh, and my female turkey was the boss over all those chickens including the roosters. It was great!
Separate Housing – Keep them in their own pen. They don’t need light, a heat lamp, or special housing. I kept mine in a tall, uninsulated dog house (I only had three turkeys) where their food was kept undercover. I filled up their feeder once a week, maybe. I did give them water twice a day in a rubber bowl that I could stomp out when it was full. I never saw the turkeys drink water in the winter and I never could tell that the water level dropped before it froze. They do like perches so I had perches outside for them and they just slept in the snow outside. For more info on keeping and raising heritage turkeys you can read about it here.
Chickens
Every year I overwinter about 20 chickens in too small of a chickenhouse, which amazingly works really well. You can read about it here. We even have ‘special’ chickens that I overwinter. Special, as in there is something wrong with them and they are slow and easy for my kids to catch. I don’t know how this happens except that I am a sucker and once again my kids are smarter than I am. These chickens don’t lay at all. At all! And yet I keep them through the winter. Big sigh. Anyway…..
Housing – I provide an insulated chicken house, this significantly reduces costs when the heat lamp is on in the winter, and keeps the birds natural heat inside the house in the winter. I created a covered outside area in the chicken park that is dry and snow-free. The covered area should also be fairly draft free, I leave the door from the chicken house to the chicken yard open during the winter.
Provide Heat – I leave the heat lamp (red light preferably) inside the insulated house, put on a thermostat. This keeps the chickens’ combs and eggs (and water bowl if inside) from freezing. I also use the deep litter method inside and outside the chicken house, it provides free heat for the birds.
Light for Laying – I provide 14 hours of LED light inside and outside the house, by using a timer. The light convinces my chickens to lay all winter, and as a bonus they can see when there are only three hours of daylight.
Provide Water, Food, and Inspire Movement – If you have a small hen house like I do, put the water and food outside the chicken house so the birds have to go outside at points during the winter day. This eliminates pecking issues and overcrowding. I give them a gallon of water morning and night. If you put the water in a rubber bowl, you can stomp the ice out pretty easily by turning the bowl upside down and stomping on the bottom.
Goats
Goats are rugged, hardy, and easy-going unless it rains or snows. One drop of rain and they race back to the barn-like the sky is falling. Goats are smart and a little bit like cats, tough smart, and they do not like to be inconvenienced. So if you want happy goats treat them like a cat.
Provide Shelter – Shelter seems obvious but shelter can be many things, an open-sided barn, a three-sided shed, or an old horse stall. In the lower 48 states, I did not need to insulate my goat barn but in a colder northern climate, it would be a good idea. A word of caution about insulation, if you insulate your goat house make sure that it is well ventilated to prevent the build-up of gasses created by animal waste. Be careful though, improper ventilation can create drafts where wind and cold air are able to blow on the animals. The most important thing is that your goats are dry and protected from the wind, goats are susceptible to pneumonia and respiratory illness and this should be taken into account when building your goat house for the winter. The bottom line ventilation is good, drafts are bad.
Clean Water – I usually have 3-5 goats over the winter. Each goat can drink about a gallon of water per day so I provide a 5-gallon electric heated water bucket. You can buy one here. Make sure the electrical cord is wrapped in wire to prevent injuries from curious nibbling goats.
Proper Nutrition – The best food for overwintering your goats is good quality hay, when a goat eats hay the rumen (One of the 4 stomachs of a goat) its stomach starts breaking down the roughage by fermentation which creates heat for the goat from the inside out. Hay is not the only form of roughage that is good for goats. Roughage can be any long-stem fibrous material, i.e.: hay, silage, beat pulp shreds, brush, grass, etc. Roughage is essential to keeping a goat warm in the winter. Goats can actually freeze to death if fed a diet of all grain and no hay because their rumen has no roughage to break down.
Support good fur growth – Goats are luckily adapted to grow furry coats for the winter. Most breeds of goats have a two layer fur system with long guard hairs on top and fluffy cashmere underneath. The cashmere works as insulation and the guard hairs help to keep water and dirt off of the goat’s skin and undercoat. Certain mineral deficiencies can lead to poor fur growth. Zinc and copper are both known to be related to hair health. You can support your goat’s fur growth by properly supplementing them with the minerals they need.
Hoof Care – if you live in a damp muddy climate make sure you check and trim hoofs often. Wet conditions can harbor bacteria that can infect improperly or overgrown hooves.
Sheep
Sheep needs are very similar to goats but without the finicky cat-like tendencies.
Shelter – Sheep are extremely cold hardy and usually don’t mind the rain or snow so your goal is to keep them reasonably dry. A large lean-to or open barn works best, sheep are reluctant to enter small shelters. When you are expecting very bad conditions coax them into the barn with a bit of grain. If you are planning on having lambs you will need to have a more secure and warm shelter because lambs are the most vulnerable for the first 48 hours.
Feed – Provide good quality hay and copper-free (copper can be toxic to sheep) minerals for most of your flock. Expectant mothers or older sheep will often need an alfalfa mix hay or the occasional ration of grain.
Water – Just like to goats sheep benefit from having clean un-frozen water available at all times.
Hoof care – I have always raised Dorper Katahdin crosses and I swear they cut their own hooves because they never were overgrown, but if you are raising other breeds remember to check and trim hooves in the fall.
Please share any tips you might have for creating a happy and healthy winter home for your animals.
