keeping chickens cool in summer heat

[beccaWA]

Hi, there. I might have posted this somewhere else, but we were having temps of 100. My girls hang out under two big spruce trees when it gets hot. I wet down the entire area under there (your mud idea). But the best thing I've found -- it lowers the temp by almost 20 degrees under there -- is the misting hoses. You can find them at Home Depot, etc. I have two, and each is 20 feet long. I string them up in the trees and they mist the whole area under there. Evaporative cooling. They work GREAT. I'd say I have mine hung about 6-8 feet above the ground. Every tiny breeze that comes along, it cools it even more. The chickens soon get the idea that the mist of water is cooler than the surrounding area.

Another thing I'm going to build and put in my coop for night (hot in there, too) is this ice chest AC. I do have power in my coop for the fan, but can run off solar or RV battery.

Apparently you can do sort of the same thing by putting an ice block in a pan and running a fan so it blows over the ice into the coop.

I also freeze large "ice cubes" by cutting off the top of 2 liter soda bottles (the ones with straight sides, not hourglass), filling them with water and freezing them. I then put the cubes in their waterers. I've heard you can just put big ice blocks in pans around where they hang out in trays too. And also in their coop. Haven't tried that though.

Really, though, the misters are the best investment I've ever made for them. Have not lost a chicken yet. Good luck.

 

[beccaWA]

 

[tatterbug]

I live in up state NY and some times we get really hot weather sometimes I take a hose and keep it on all day and my hens walk threw it all day they seem to like it and they love the rainsilly hens

 

[dana0710]

We are in Texas and its hot and humid we have a nipple watering system hooked up to of of those orange coolers. I free big juice jigs and drop them in. The water stays cold for days. I just trade them out and refreeze. I also freeze all of our watermelon rinds and throw them out for a treat. And I use old. Utter containers, full them with water and chopped up feuit or scrambled eggs and put out the whole ice block out. I usually wet down the run at least once a day and they stand in the puddles.

 

[Terri's Chickens]

I know this is an older thread BUT in the Midwest states we are having a heat wave unlike anything we have seen all year. In an attempt to help my 18 laying hens (some not quite laying but should any day) and our one Rooster... King George, my water supply is a small pig trough, I have the hose in the trough and opened slowly to allow cool fresh water to flow into it all day, the over spill is pooling in areas around the waterer and allow my flock to dig through the mud and cool water. Although I'm tempted to mist or water down my flock directly for comfort I know NOT to do this as this can break down natural oils in their feathers that help them keep cool. I tossed in a half a watermelon a few moments ago. With the rise of the heat I have also seen a huge increase in flies which are so bad when I walk into one of the two indoor chicken areas it sounds like a swarm of bees. I'm really at a loss as to what to do about the flies, if anyone has any suggestions that would be wonderful.

In my main indoor area we have soft dirt floor which the flock loves to scratch, dig and dust bathe, that leads into a horse stall type portion where my laying boxes and roosting poles are, this area I keep deep with straw and all nesting boxes have straw which I change out about every three to four days. I'm tempted while it is so hot to remove all straw in this area except for that in my nesting boxes and take that area down to the bare wooden floor, would that help keep them cooler??

Terri Peters
"Chicken Lady" @ Big-R Gibson City, IL

 

[zteagirl71]

I wish I had looked this up earlier, I lost one of my best laying hens today. I went to check on the girls since it has been SO HOT for past week, I found her laying half in and half out of the nesting box. I just burst into tears - poor little thing - and it's ALL my fault! I should have sprayed the run down earlier, but got distracted in my nice cool house! I thought they would be fine since it's shaded and their nesting boxes are on the north side of the coop out of the sun. So much for that reasoning.

I like the frozen liter bottle idea, I will do that and put one near each of their nesting boxes. I'm SO upset with myself! I can't bear the thought of how she suffered (Snifffff!!!)

 

[chickwhispers]

@zteagirl71 So sorry about your hen.

 

[MarcoPollo]

I wish I had looked this up earlier, I lost one of my best laying hens today. I went to check on the girls since it has been SO HOT for past week, I found her laying half in and half out of the nesting box. I just burst into tears - poor little thing - and it's ALL my fault! I should have sprayed the run down earlier, but got distracted in my nice cool house! I thought they would be fine since it's shaded and their nesting boxes are on the north side of the coop out of the sun. So much for that reasoning.

I like the frozen liter bottle idea, I will do that and put one near each of their nesting boxes. I'm SO upset with myself! I can't bear the thought of how she suffered (Snifffff!!!)

I'm sorry you lost your hen

. Don't beat yourself up over it though! Chickens can usually deal with high temps as long as there is shade and water. They will also usually deal with being in a hot coop to lay an egg. Your hen may have passed away from something that you didn't know about and could have done nothing about anyway. Chickens can hide illness and internal issues until it is beyond "too late" to help them. Or sometimes you just don't notice their symptoms right away.
I'm sure your other chickens will appreciate the cool-down help though.

 

[gilchicken]

We are in California and the last few days it had been over 100* ever single day. .. So I put some water with ice, mint leaves, some lemongrass leaned and some chia seeds. . And they LOVE that...

 

[zteagirl71]

Thank you so much

I told my sister how much I hate learning from my mistakes, but the hard lessons they teach me "stick" the best.