Best Coops for Hot Weather???

[egzactly]

I also live in Central Texas. We just moved our 6 weeks old chickens into our new coop and here are some ideas we came up with to deal with the Texas heat. The coop/run we built is 8X12 with a metal roof covering the entire structure. The coop portion is 3X8. The interior wall (the wall inside the run) and the roof of the coop (also inside the run area, so it's covered by the metal roof as well) are designed to be removeable. This means during the summer the coop will have 3 walls and a very high metal roof. During the winter, we will slide in a roof panel and the 4th wall to create a fully enclosed box. So far this concept is working great for summer, we'll see how it goes when winter comes.

 

[TerriLaChicks]

Here's ours - it has wire all around the top. During the winter we staple visqueen over it to keep it warm inside, during summer it's open - predators can't get in (use hardware cloth) and there's plenty of air circulation. It's in an area with plenty of shade. The chicks all do well in spite of our La humidity & heat. It's 8x12 in size.

 

[koolkyle08]

I live in Florida just north of Tampa. Summers have many days in the 90's and a few in the 100's during the hottest part of the day. Winters can get a few hours below freezing at nights. LOTS of open air. Here is what I did...

I would consider an auto watering system as chickens regulate their body temperature with water intake. I add a frozen 2 liter bottle to the 5 gallon water bucket to keep the water cooled a bit.

We live in Wesley Chapel north of Tampa and I LOVE this coop design.... might need to copy it!!! I have 5 little bantam cochin chicks and 2 RIR chicks currently, bantams are 3 weeks old and my RIR's are a week... I was wondering how to make something that would help them cope with the heat.... and this is SO HELPFUL!!! thank you for posting these pics whenever you did!

 

[bjp70437]

Ventilation is the key to a good hot weather coop!