I lost 2 when the heat first started last month, and had one sick w/ heat a couple days ago, brought her up to the porch and let her spend the night in the chicken "jail" and she's okay since. We have been over 105 most days since early June, 100 + everyday. I have 3 small coops, which have double shade cloth awnings to cool one side of the coop and provide shade in addition to the covered run. Late morning I will empty and wash their wading pools, a 2x3' storage container that is about 8" deep, and rinse the rock that sits in it. Refill it w/ the coolest water that comes from hose, also thoroughly wet down the soil in the run (I put a couple bags of landscape sand in each run when the heat started) and under the shade cloth . Return the wading pool under the shade cloth. Fill their drinking bucket w/ cool water. If it is already hot, will hose down the coop. Early afternoon when the heat is building I take out milk jugs half filled and frozen solid, placing one in each wading pool. Add a couple blocks of ice made in coolwhip bowls to the drinking buckets. I will also give them a small amount of frozen grapes or a cold piece of fruit. Today all I had was some old frozen veges, which they ate. In the peak of the heat, I go out about 4 and replace the ice in the drinking water otherwise it gets hot, like a hot bathwater hot. After 6 pm I take them their evening snack, which is primarily chopped fruit and vegetables or cold leftovers. If I feed back eggs, I make sure they are cold. They have good feed available all the time, but by evening they won't eat it. Anyway, they do perk up and spend time out in their yards (foraging time is early morning) until dark. I started the cold snack at night when I found a dish of sherbert to be quite cooling one day after I had been outside. I might try freezing yougurt also. On the super hot day, 115+ I will hook up the rain bird irrigation sprinkler and run it for a while to cool the ground and coops. With the drought conditions, I try not to do that. I give them as much fruit and veges as I do, since my local grocer will let me take the waste produce for free. I am so grateful that he does that.
