Well... Ever... The only REAL reason ya'll stay inside when it gets that cold, because in Burr Oak... There ain't a darn thing to do in the middle of winter. Unless you're a kid and you're running about in the middle of the night with your cousins having improper snow ball fights that are aimed in bad directions, taking out windows, then running like all get out to hide. You know how some of them Burr Oak people are. And it wasn't my fault. It was Harvey's and Jaybirds. Beaner (Cabrina) was to cold to go out. LOL. OH, and lets not forget hood riding... ya know... hook an old car hood up to a chain, chain to a truck, and go for a sled ride... Or maybe that was just when I was stupid enough to think it was a good idea with the cousins... Hmmm...
Speaking of heat lamps, I am right of Lake Mich. I used heat last year because I ended up with some sick birds. My first winter I had NO frost bite, used no heat lamps either. Last winter, heat lamps... Lost toes, comb points... If you don't need to, don't. If the temps are getting down in the negatives in double digits at night, what you really want to do is just before bed, hot oatmeal, and corn. Corn burns hot in the birds. Just like in summer you want to have LESS corn in their feed, but higher protien. Check that your birds have a full crop, yes, even if that means you are feeling up 60+ birds. The way my roosts are, I can duck in between the rows to get to every bird.
A birds used to heat sources are dead birds when those heat sources are suddenly gone because of power outages and the birds haven't developed a heavy down for winter..
Dear Lord. Jaybird and I were in the same car in driver's training, way back when. LMAO. I never did the hood riding, though. I was the sickly member of the family. The only part of that which has changed is that I am a lot more careful of being exposed to others when they are ill, due to my compromised immune system and the rare disease. (Nothing like a 4-hour bug for the rest of the family that puts me down for 3 days, and possibly in the hospital getting fluids and calcium gluconate to keep my heart from stopping, right?)
I am in the process of installing more roosting areas to accommodate the extra birds, at least until they are sent to freezer camp. I was going to defrost my freezer today, but it was too danged hot to do anything other than nap. After having slept until 6pm yesterday, you wouldn't think I would still need a nap, but it was a heck of a week at work. LOL.
The closest we have to any sort of heat lamp is the light inside the coop. Just enough to take a little of the edge off, but without actually affecting the temperature much. The ones we had through this last winter all seemed to fair quite well. In total, I have had a whole 2 birds die of unknown causes, 3 of my free rangers and 3 in my original make-shift run were taken by some sort of local predator(s), and it appears we have lost 2 of the free range baby chicks to (most likely) the local hawk.
On a separate note: I have a young man who will be 17 years old at 8:43 am tomorrow, a measly 12 hours from now. I just told him that at 4:30am, I am coming in to dump a bucket of water on him and ask him, "How does that feel, jerk?" LOL. He's free for the taking, if anyone wants him. He'll eat you out of house and home, refuse to do anything that doesn't agree with his agenda, swear like a sailor, and get in your face... but he's such a nice young man. LOLOLOL.
I feel really darned old. *sigh*