Is this at all possible?

[Bettacreek]

Yes, I agree on that one. Right now it's jerry-rigged for heat. I plan to build a little frame that comes down for a higher wattage heat lamp, so that it's sturdier and further away from the bedding. Right now, everyone is too small to dislodge the jerry-rigging, but I want it out of there within the week, hopefully it'll be fixed tomorrow. I can easily add ventilation, just cut an area out of the door (away from the framing boards) and staple some welded wire in there. Maybe creating a small overhanging in case of rain. The wind usually blows North West, sometimes North East, but never comes FROM the West, so no direct wind will hit it.

 

[Bettacreek]

It's 9.25' x 13.75', so about 127 square ft. With them going outside for the most part, I'm thinking this will be fine. I plan to keep ahold of three turkeys, possibly four. Then raise 25-50 cornish x for 8 weeks, and hopefully overwinter about six of them. So, ten birds, 6 being chickens, 4 being turkeys, I think it'll be ample room for them over winter as well. That gives them 12.7 square ft per bird.

ETA: The above calculations are for overwintering purposes, when the birds will be stuck indoors more than not. During the summer, with everyone outside most of the time, is when I'll be raising the meat birds. They'll have a more limited space, but it won't be as big of a deal with them free-ranging most of the time. When I raised birds before, they were in a 8x4 pen, and I had about ten ducks, a turkey, six or seven cornish x and four layers. That was 1.52sq ft per bird and it was enough room for all of them. It'd be different if they had to live in there constantly, but with the free-ranging, it worked quite well. Here I plan to give them more sq ft per bird, even with the meaties so I honestly don't think size will be an issue.

 

[so lucky]

Was that the corner of a window I saw in the second photo? If so, you might be able to utilize it for ventilation, too.

 

[Bettacreek]

Yes, there's one window in there, unfortunately, it's a basement window (from the first/main part of the basement) that doesn't open, and only looks into the basement. :/

 

[pinkfox]

honestly i dont think keeping it warm Will be an issue even if you just do deep litter for winter...My parents have an UNINSULATED plywood shed as their coop and there in CT, the chickens first winter 8 ft of snow on the gorund through most winter (no im not kidding, we were getting a foot+ per night with no melt inbetween) it wasnt "warm" in there by any means but it certinaly wasnt cold and our hens (about 6 months old at the time) were perfectly fine with NO suplimental heat or insulation. just about 6-8 inches of good ole kiln drived pine shavings on the floor, they started the shaving layer in early fall and by the spring clean out we had about 12 inches depth to remove, we didnt need wading boots and had no gunk or odor, once a week mum whent in with the rake and stirred it up under the roost, once a month it got dusted with DE (use a mask) and a couple bags of fresh shavings and we had no problems. the biggest issue we had was the waterer freezing, the hens did perfectly fine though, even our ver large combed milie bird ("columbian rock" (her comb is large enough that everyone things shes a rooster lol)

 

[FarmerJamie]

what pinkfox said....

 

[Bettacreek]

Well, I won't be getting much sleep tonight... I'll be checking on everyone throughout the night to make sure they're ok. So far they seem to be fine, though the temps will continue to drop. I might have to make a midnight walmart run for the heavier heat light. Would just go buy it now, but I just spent the last hour or so searching for my three missing poults.

 

[terri9630]

Why would you try to over winter 6 cornish cross?

 

[Bettacreek]

Experimentation.

 

[pinkfox]

why not?...

just because they are typically raised to be bowlingballs by 12 weeks doesnt mean they HAVE to be...