Good Morning everyone! Here's my little story:
This last Monday, the first warm/hot day getting into the 80s here. BF and I had the coop open, the girls were mostly in the run and in the coop. It was in the afternoon, so the hottest part of the day. The coop gets full sun, and when the big door is opened to let them come free range it faces West, and so the afternoon sun can pound it. I observed the girls were sunbathing but also panting. I was thinking "Why don't they move to a cooler part of the yard if they're hot? And also, it's only early May. It's going to get much hotter." But really, they might not know where to go yet. And then I saw the little one, Taco, doing something that really scared me: She was standing (in the direct sun, silly thing) but her wings drooped away from her body AND she was panting. I grabbed her and took her a few feet to the shade where the breeze is nice. Put her on the ground in front of me and held her wings out so she could cool down. After a minute or so she stopped panting. BF told me that another chicken was acting like Taco, so I grabbed her and did the same thing. Then another. They all responded pretty well. And when I let them free they stayed in the shaded area and quickly resumed acting like happy chickens. We figured the coop was probably too hot, so we propped open the egg collection door. (Extra info: Their combs are still small and they really don't have wattles yet, so they can't cool that way. We'd had the pop door open since morning, and we do have holes drilled for ventilation, which I'd thought in combination would be adequate. Apparently not, at least in our afternoon sun.) And so the moral of my story is this: Your birds CAN overheat, even in mild May weather. Ventilation is critical. I've been wanting to share this story for all the new chicken keepers I see in this thread, as this is my first year with chickens also and I don't want anyone's birds lost to the mentality "meh, good enough."
Going forward, we're going to augment the ventilation in the coop. We're sure to check on the girls especially in the afternoon heat, and when we let them roam we prop open the egg collection hatch to let the coop cool. The huge maple across the street will help with shade once the leaves mature. We'll probably procure a shade structure of our own as well. I hope my story helps someone's chickens stay happy and comfortable.
This last Monday, the first warm/hot day getting into the 80s here. BF and I had the coop open, the girls were mostly in the run and in the coop. It was in the afternoon, so the hottest part of the day. The coop gets full sun, and when the big door is opened to let them come free range it faces West, and so the afternoon sun can pound it. I observed the girls were sunbathing but also panting. I was thinking "Why don't they move to a cooler part of the yard if they're hot? And also, it's only early May. It's going to get much hotter." But really, they might not know where to go yet. And then I saw the little one, Taco, doing something that really scared me: She was standing (in the direct sun, silly thing) but her wings drooped away from her body AND she was panting. I grabbed her and took her a few feet to the shade where the breeze is nice. Put her on the ground in front of me and held her wings out so she could cool down. After a minute or so she stopped panting. BF told me that another chicken was acting like Taco, so I grabbed her and did the same thing. Then another. They all responded pretty well. And when I let them free they stayed in the shaded area and quickly resumed acting like happy chickens. We figured the coop was probably too hot, so we propped open the egg collection door. (Extra info: Their combs are still small and they really don't have wattles yet, so they can't cool that way. We'd had the pop door open since morning, and we do have holes drilled for ventilation, which I'd thought in combination would be adequate. Apparently not, at least in our afternoon sun.) And so the moral of my story is this: Your birds CAN overheat, even in mild May weather. Ventilation is critical. I've been wanting to share this story for all the new chicken keepers I see in this thread, as this is my first year with chickens also and I don't want anyone's birds lost to the mentality "meh, good enough."
Going forward, we're going to augment the ventilation in the coop. We're sure to check on the girls especially in the afternoon heat, and when we let them roam we prop open the egg collection hatch to let the coop cool. The huge maple across the street will help with shade once the leaves mature. We'll probably procure a shade structure of our own as well. I hope my story helps someone's chickens stay happy and comfortable.
