Anyone else nervous about this heat?

[erinchelsea]

It's over a hundred degrees here, and my Cornish Rock cross are 7 weeks old. We were planning on butchering this weekend. I'm not sure they will all make it, they are panting like crazy. 2 of the biggest sound a little wheezy even. i put out 4 extra gallon waterers so they wouldn't have to walk at all to get water & put electrolytes in there too. They can free range and the run has several nice big shade trees. not sure what else I can do. I'm going to try to talk DH into staying home in the morning and butchering the biggest birds.

 

[flewdacoop]

they should be ok aslong as they have shade water and ventilation.. it was 107 here yesterday and been in the hundreds for about 3 days in a row, mine are about3 months old now and they pant alot but i use a water hose and wet their run and it helps cool them down

 

[jdc]

I had one die from my first batch and one that came close during transport to the processor. We sprayed the one that was close with the hose and set him in the shade. He came back to and made it until processing the next morning. Good luck.

 

[AmyLM]

one word: YES!!!

We have huge high velocity fans, tarps, watering down the ground, kid pools full of water (with pieces of wood, bricks, and rocks for them to stand on) and when it was clear that they were really getting miserable... we bought a cheap air conditioning unit at wallmart today and installed it in the window in the hen house in the barn. LOL yes... air conditioning for our chickens. Well... its better than loosing them. A neighbor told us that of her dozen jersey giants... only 3 survived the summer last year. So take any precautions you deem necessary.

 

[LilyD]

We hit 97 for the first time in quite some time up here and I lost a Gold Comet hen. She had been fine the day before and went into the nesting box and I found her there dead when I did morning chores. Even with the vents open it was so hot in there. I have started leaving the human door open as well as all the other vents and the back side of the nesting boxes so that they get as much air as possible. They have tons of water and plenty of shade in the yard.
Not sure what else to do for them.

 

[ci_cyfarth]

A little, though my run has a solar gray SunTuf roof, ventilation is good, they can get into a shady spot under the coop, and I'm making sure to ensure they have access to cool water all day.


They were panting a little when I came in tonight, but anything with a pulse will be panting most of this week, so I'm going to cross my fingers and hope for the best.

 

[what did I do]

Yes, mine all made it. I was so glad when the temperature dropped back to normal

 

[Life is Good!]

Put a box fan if there is no breeze - that helps a lot. Shade is great, but without a breeze they'll be hotter.
Misters work too, although since the drought, our FR's were terrified of raindrops of any kind. (Rained 2 times for 10min each while they were here)
If they're eating treats, consider refrigerating a watermelon, then slicing it for them....that's a wonderous food!

 

[Oregon Blues]

Heat is hard on them.

Use deep shade and fans If the area has low humidity, spray the ground they are on to dampen it. Wetting probably doesn't do any good if humidity is high because it cools by evaporation and nothing evaporates when the humidity is way up there.

Waterers must be in the shade or water gets too hot to drink. I've been known to drop some ice cubes into the drinking water to keep it cool enough to drink.

Good luck.

 

[erinchelsea]

So far they are all hanging in there. It's shady today so not as bad. I tried putting out some shredded zucchini I had in my freezer but they wouldn't touch it, guess they didn't realize it was food, lol. Guess I should have given it my hens- they would have gobbled it up!

We definitely have plenty of breeze outside, it's always windy here on the prairie, but what drives me crazy is the birds that sit in the coop panting like crazy! Go outside and sit under the trees and feel the breeze! I put plenty of water and their food outside in the shade for a reason...