Where I live the temprature in summer ranges from 91-104F(35-41C).I give my hens oats and lots of water with ice-cubes in it. are there other ways to cool them down?
Is the humidity high, too? Just wondering. Our summer temps are usually 95-98 and can get above 100. On especially hot humid days (these are the most dangerous), I use box fans to cool the hens down if I see that they are uncomfortable, such as panting and wings held away from the body. I have read that corn will raise body temperature (I don't have a good study on this to give you a link to...so it may be hogwash, I don't know), so I don't feed straight cracked corn or whole corn in the summer. Other than that, the chickens do quite well as long as they have a lot of shade to rest in.
I had some really rough days this past summer. Our temps were in the 100's on a regular basis. It was hard on the hens. We tried several things . . . . There were even a few days when I went out there in the morning with a 5 gallon bucket of water and everyone got a dip. I did it in the morning so that they were totally dry by night time. I planted some quick growing bushes / trees to help with the shading for next year. I tried a fan - - but they were afraid of it. They were already stressed from the heat. . . . so I stopped the fan ASAP. If you are going to use a fan, I would introduce it an hour at a time when the temps are not so high. . . i.e. 80's. We actually hooked a mister up to the fan so that it would cool and add humidity. We were dry, so dry, this year. It would oh helped cool them off IF they hadn't of veen so scared of it . . .
When it got so hot here I started letting them out every morning. They would immediately head underneath the shed. That was there favorite place all summer long. When I started doing all this I figured I would rather lose one to a predator than for them to die of a heat stroke!! ETA: Never lost one either!
I run a box fan all summer. If you can get them to stand in a small wading pool this helps; try floating some cabbage leaves or something on the water to encourage them. They need breeze and shade in the heat. We get about the same temps as you in the summer, and they will pant and hold their wings away from their body, but I've never lost one to heat either. They have to be miserable some days, though. Some people have good luck with a small gentle sprinkler, but I can't get mine to go near it. I have also bodily dunked them on really bad days.
Thanks guys. I now have a wading pool in the shade that they use. They're too scared of fans for that to work.
