Help! Chicken panting!

[KayP]

My chickens beaks are open and their waddles are clapping together like their heart is in their throats and beating fast! They are holding their wings away from their bodies. It's only in the 80s. Could they be overheated? If not, then what? I'm so worried.

 

[briana1975]

It sounds like hot chickens. But hopefully someone else will post that will know more than me.

 

[shay20]

Its ok, it just means they are hot, cool them down either with a fan near by or you can splash some water on them, make sure they nice clean cool water to drink, Wait how old are they?

 

[NurseNettie]

How old are they, etc? What are you keeping them in/ around? Make sure if they're young and under a heat source you give them plenty of space to get away from the heat source, and LOTS Of free choice water.

If they're older and in a coop/ etc, same deal-- make sure they can get to a cool spot, plenty of water, and sometimes I've heard of people filling soda bottles and freezing them and setting them in the coop on hot days so they can get some relief from the heat that way. Make sure there's ventilation and fresh air.

I *think* you can spray them with a water bottle to help relieve some of the heat, but not sure-- best to wait and see if someone else with more experience comes along.

Chickens do pant to get rid of heat, so they just might need to cool down a bit that way.

Good luck!

 

[Thomas423]

Sounds like they were hot to me. We went from cool to VERY HOT today in Maryland. Heck, I was panting and flapping my arms today while we were out working on coop. It's much nicer out now.....how are they doing now? Hopefully they'll be fine in the morning but tomorrow is supposed to be even hotter.

 

[KayP]

Just checked and it's the same. Now one that wasn't doing that- is and since it's dark in there I felt her waddles and they're hot! It's not hot out there now, and I have the big vent windows open. They're 9 mos. All layed beautiful eggs this morning. Should I spray them now? They're roosting and trying to sleep but still doing the panting thing. I feel so helpless. I hope they'll be ok. Can they die from this? I'm going to put some soda bottles in the freezer for tomorrow.

 

[Homesteading_Bound]

My two Roo's and hen were panting. I figured they don't sweat...so that's how they cool down.

They free rang during the day.

It was 86 today.

They have fresh water. I figured they were warm....

You know how busy they can be. Running from one area to another, digging, scratching, crowing...I wasn't concerned

 

[KayP]

Does anyone know how long it takes em to cool down?

 

[PunkinPeep]

I'm not exactly the chicken expert, but i was just thinking that after a long time when it's cold outside, i get acclimated to that temperature, so when it starts warming up, it seems much warmer than it actually is. If the high has been 50 degrees for the last 4 months, then when it's 75 outside, it seems like 90 until my blood thins out or whatever it does.

Maybe it's kind of the same for chickens.

 

[Glenda L Heywood]

chickens tend to cool down IF you take them some ice water when they are hot like that
I would imagine by midnite they would be cooled down
I would have taken the ice water out for them
if they are that hot it must be a very small chicken house and you should have one window open across room from the other window and they with ice bottles in the water will be okay