Another Newbie question about how do chickens handle heat,

[Tala]

Quote:
Yes, I'm conjuring up a better coop for them this year. It should only have a roof and one wall, so there will be LOTS of ventilation!

 

[gsim]

Definitely a fan 24-7. We used one here in Tenn during July. I have wired my henhouse for a ceiling fan and it is directly beneath the roof-mounted turbine-vent I installed when building my 8x16 coop. Will run it reverse to push air up and out, but I never got to install the fan there yet. So much to do on the whole project that I just used an old box-fan and set it in a window. Heat and lung problems kill more adult chickens than cold. Great tip on blocks of ice and also pans of water. My pen is so big that I can put that outside. (It has a perimeter of 180 ft and 4 courses of hot wire to keep coons out.)

24 hens of 4 breeds and all healty and get along well. No fighting that we ever see.

 

[Picky Chicky]

God knows I killed about three fans this summer. I tried the ice method but working 40 hours a week prevented me from being consistent. I'm happy to say that all my girls (and one roo) made it through our summer heat a-ok, but dern if they didn't stop laying on me! Now we're suffering a molt and I'm unhappily buying store eggs. ((grumble))

 

[cnj-tx50]

I started my flock of 24 hens and 1 roo in June this year and built the coop raised 2 feet off the ground with expanded metal flooring that will be covered in the winter, but during the summer there is almost always a breeze from underneath and with 3 windows - east, south and west - they seem to do okay. However, when we had 100 plus days with humidity that made the heat index in the 110's I put a barrell fan underneath the coop. They all hand out underneath in the shade and with the fan. I also freeze grape, blueberries, watermellow for them as a treat.