Keeping Your Chickens Cool

The hottest days of the summer are upon us, and everyone is suffering - including your chickens!  Heavily feathered breeds like the Buff Orpington and Wyandotte are at a distinct disadvantage this time of year compared to closely feathered, Mediterranean, and tropical breeds such as the Rhode Island Red and the Leghorn.

A chicken's body temperature is normally between 104 and 107 degrees Fahrenheit.  Their body temperature is lethal when it reaches between 113 and 117 degrees Fahrenheit.  Therefore it is extremely important to keep chickens cool when the outside temperature starts hitting the triple digits.  If a chicken is unable to dissipate its body heat, it can become heat sick very quickly.  

Birds do not sweat, and (unfortunately in hot weather) their feathers do an excellent job of trapping heat against their bodies.  Luckily, their respiratory systems are very good at cooling them off.  Many people are surprised to learn how different a chicken's respiratory system is from ours.  Chickens essentially have four lungs, placed throughout their body.  Instead of breathing in and out like we do, chickens breathe in a circuit.  This gives each breath ample time to exchange temperature with their body interior.

Ventilation and air movement are key.  If chickens are stuck in a closed coop for very long, the temperature will quickly skyrocket.  In hot parts of the country, some chicken owners even resort to outfitting their chicken coops with air conditioners!  Even if you don't plan to go this far, fans set up to bring cool air in near the ground and vent hot air out near the roof will make a big difference.

An outdoor mister or fogger system can often be purchased from your nearest home improvement store.  These are designed to make outdoor patios more comfortable, but they work great in the chicken pen, too!  They hook onto your hose just like a regular sprinkler, and deliver a fine mist.  This evaporative cooling is remarkably effective.  

Shade is also important, particularly in the run during the day.  Don't simply drop a blue tarp over the run, because these can magnify and trap the heat.  Instead, purchase a swath of "shade cloth" from the home improvement store.  Shade cloth is sold in the gardening section, and is rated by the percentage of sun that it blocks.  Buy the highest protection value you can afford - no one ever regretted buying shade cloth that was too strong!

Any "old school" chicken keeper will tell you not to feed your chickens scratch in hot weather, because scratch is "warming."  I don't know about that.  Scratch is very high in calories, and calories are of course what your body burns for heat, so there may be some truth to the "warming" claims.  

However, chickens will often go off their feed in extremely hot weather.  In which case it can be difficult to keep the weight on them.  When this happens, scratch can be a valuable feed supplement, because it delivers more calories per ounce.  Offering scratch first thing in the morning when the weather is still relatively cool can help fuel your chickens through the heat of the day.

Photo credit: Flickr/mrlerone