thanks cool...... How cold is it at your place as of today.. you have no snow I see
Lost due to cold
- Thread starter TexanConnection
- Start date
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TwoAcreDream
Well-known member
Kindling in cold temps / winter is rough.
My animals are inside a building. So no snow, wind or ice on them or me.
However the temps are basically the same as outside. No heat.
My cages are wire. I prefer wood nest boxes. Metal is okay if the bottom
is wood. I use lots of hay in them. Doe needs to pull a decent amount of fur.
I recently got some new wood nest boxes with tiny hole wire for the bottom. Wrong
One doe did not pull enough fur.
There was plenty of hay but the doe had dug a lot of digging, right down to the wire bottom. I blame myself more than the doe. Her second litter and it was 8 babies. Maybe if I had got to them a half hour quicker, and the floor would have
been wood, it would have been a save. Needless to say I scrambled to
get cardboard under the other wire floors. Those nest boxes will have the wire swapped out for regular wood floors. They might be good for summer time use, but not now. I have boxes coming ordered the way I want them.
The lop is in a plastic bottom maternity cage ( big dog crate ) in metal nest box with wood floor. I really thought those were a good idea, but using sawdust holds frozen urine on a plastic floor. The floor has to be cleaned daily. Nest
box has lots of hay. Molly has 5 babies and they are doing well, but I check her often. The mixed doe in same set up doing good, has 6 her own, and the 2 fostered.
The other does with babies are in wire stacking units. Plastic drop pans.
Wood nest boxes and a couple of metal w/ wood botoms. Lots of hay.
Until I can come up with some better ideas, this is what is working now.
I give them boxes about 4 days ahead of their due date. I want to make
sure I have them on the corrent side of the cage to make the doe happy.
I mumble if I have to clean the boxes if they poop in them, but I can under
stand where they are coming from. Cold wire floors are not a good thing
in the wintertime on their pawpaws. Most all my boxes have a rest board
across the back section of the box, for the doe to sit. Some does use it,
some don't. I have 2 does that are liking to sit in the box with the kids.
I figure if there is plenty of room, then it is not a bad thing. Like they
would listen to me not to.....
Two of the does use the top rest board a lot. I have one real nervous doe that has to be pulled out of the cage if something is going on that makes a lot of noise. Like the hubby shoveling snow off their metal roof this morning
Good thing I was out there talking to them. She had them scattered in the box.
I tucked em back in, and mommy went in a cage on the floor to calm down.
I am thinking of a different style nest box for her. One that has higher sides
and has a full roof board. Opening just in the front.
My animals are inside a building. So no snow, wind or ice on them or me.
However the temps are basically the same as outside. No heat.
My cages are wire. I prefer wood nest boxes. Metal is okay if the bottom
is wood. I use lots of hay in them. Doe needs to pull a decent amount of fur.
I recently got some new wood nest boxes with tiny hole wire for the bottom. Wrong
One doe did not pull enough fur. There was plenty of hay but the doe had dug a lot of digging, right down to the wire bottom. I blame myself more than the doe. Her second litter and it was 8 babies. Maybe if I had got to them a half hour quicker, and the floor would have
been wood, it would have been a save. Needless to say I scrambled to
get cardboard under the other wire floors. Those nest boxes will have the wire swapped out for regular wood floors. They might be good for summer time use, but not now. I have boxes coming ordered the way I want them.
The lop is in a plastic bottom maternity cage ( big dog crate ) in metal nest box with wood floor. I really thought those were a good idea, but using sawdust holds frozen urine on a plastic floor. The floor has to be cleaned daily. Nest
box has lots of hay. Molly has 5 babies and they are doing well, but I check her often. The mixed doe in same set up doing good, has 6 her own, and the 2 fostered.
The other does with babies are in wire stacking units. Plastic drop pans.
Wood nest boxes and a couple of metal w/ wood botoms. Lots of hay.
Until I can come up with some better ideas, this is what is working now.
I give them boxes about 4 days ahead of their due date. I want to make
sure I have them on the corrent side of the cage to make the doe happy.
I mumble if I have to clean the boxes if they poop in them, but I can under
stand where they are coming from. Cold wire floors are not a good thing
in the wintertime on their pawpaws. Most all my boxes have a rest board
across the back section of the box, for the doe to sit. Some does use it,
some don't. I have 2 does that are liking to sit in the box with the kids.
I figure if there is plenty of room, then it is not a bad thing. Like they
would listen to me not to.....
Two of the does use the top rest board a lot. I have one real nervous doe that has to be pulled out of the cage if something is going on that makes a lot of noise. Like the hubby shoveling snow off their metal roof this morning
Good thing I was out there talking to them. She had them scattered in the box.
I tucked em back in, and mommy went in a cage on the floor to calm down.
I am thinking of a different style nest box for her. One that has higher sides
and has a full roof board. Opening just in the front.
the low was 24 last night, high today 55, -it has melted all the snow. It was 7 below 0 in Nov. and now it is T-shirt weather, -- what a wierd winter we are having.
GBov
Well-known member
I have wire bottomed wooden nest boxes and I put down a layer of hay BEFORE I put the nest box in. It gives a layer that the doe cant dig through and the kits cant burrow through to land on wire.
When I process fryers now I wash the hide really well and nail the hides down to a plank, skin side up, under the fan in the dining room. When they are stiff and flat as a board I pull it off and then, with nice sharp scissors, cut the fur off, right down by the roots.
That way I have PILES of extra fur for does that don't pull enough.
So far its saved a few lives.
Half my cages have built in wire nest cages that I wrap with feed sacks if its going to be cold and, if its going to be VERY COLD, I line with cardboard too.
So far I like the nest cages best as no kits have ever been pulled out to freeze, like happens with the normal nest boxes.
When I process fryers now I wash the hide really well and nail the hides down to a plank, skin side up, under the fan in the dining room. When they are stiff and flat as a board I pull it off and then, with nice sharp scissors, cut the fur off, right down by the roots.
That way I have PILES of extra fur for does that don't pull enough.
So far its saved a few lives.
Half my cages have built in wire nest cages that I wrap with feed sacks if its going to be cold and, if its going to be VERY COLD, I line with cardboard too.
So far I like the nest cages best as no kits have ever been pulled out to freeze, like happens with the normal nest boxes.
