First of all, I am so sorry to hear about all you folks losing some of your dear feathered family members.
So many of you live in places where this sort of unrelenting heat is not usual for humans or animals, so they have no tolerance for it. Much of the summer here, especially the months of August and September, is what you are dealing with right now: I can say from experience it is unpleasant and can't go away quickly enough. Although my chickens have been born and raised in this warm, humid environment, they still have a hard time on the worst days.
I read a great idea on another thread on helping to keep the girls cool. She freezes milk jugs full of water and then places them in front of the fan in her coop: It lowered the temperature a great deal. I have one of those round high velocity fans hanging upside down from my ceiling rafters in my long coop (hardware cloth on three walls). I plan on adding either a wire shelf or some way to hang the frozen milk jugs in front of the air flow in the next week....before the worst of the summer arrives.
Something else you may consider is picking up some shade cloth, or even the landscape weed screen and making a sun block for your coop. If you can stand the look of it, you could drive a couple T-posts and zip tie the fabric to it to block the afternoon sun from reaching the majority of the coop. You could attach one side to the eaves or fascia of the coop and run it to the top of the posts....making the cloth like a porch roof. I did this for our ducks and it is helping a great deal: They do not have the big oaks over their area shading them like the chickens do. On the hottest days, I set a garden hose up to act like a mister (use one of those cheap plastic shut off valves you screw on the end barely opened) to spray the top of the shade cloth, which they seem to like too. Then again their duck and they like anything to do with water.
Tractor supply has up to 7" tall posts available for under $7 each. It also gives them added protection from hawks, which is great too.
I read a great idea on another thread on helping to keep the girls cool. She freezes milk jugs full of water and then places them in front of the fan in her coop: It lowered the temperature a great deal. I have one of those round high velocity fans hanging upside down from my ceiling rafters in my long coop (hardware cloth on three walls). I plan on adding either a wire shelf or some way to hang the frozen milk jugs in front of the air flow in the next week....before the worst of the summer arrives.
Something else you may consider is picking up some shade cloth, or even the landscape weed screen and making a sun block for your coop. If you can stand the look of it, you could drive a couple T-posts and zip tie the fabric to it to block the afternoon sun from reaching the majority of the coop. You could attach one side to the eaves or fascia of the coop and run it to the top of the posts....making the cloth like a porch roof. I did this for our ducks and it is helping a great deal: They do not have the big oaks over their area shading them like the chickens do. On the hottest days, I set a garden hose up to act like a mister (use one of those cheap plastic shut off valves you screw on the end barely opened) to spray the top of the shade cloth, which they seem to like too. Then again their duck and they like anything to do with water.
Tractor supply has up to 7" tall posts available for under $7 each. It also gives them added protection from hawks, which is great too.
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