Wednesday, August 3, 2011

Chicken Scrum and Heat Mitigation

We've been worried about the extreme heat here in Texas over the past weeks and its effect on our chickens. Unfortunately it is expected to get worse - if that's even possible. This entire week is supposed to be between 106-108 degrees with the heat index around 115! Horrendous, depressing, draining - every bad adjective and verb you can imagine! We've been adding ice to their water 3 times per day, and between 12pm and 8pm, every hour, we hose the chickens down with cold water. It does seem to help a bit - but they continue to pant as if their lives depended on it - and, sadly, they do!




So you can imagine my surprise when I went out there a few days ago and found all of the "babies" huddled as close as they could possibly get to one another - a veritable chicken scrum! Except instead of chasing a rugby ball they were each determined to find the deepest, coolest section of dirt they could lay their feathers on. I guess they're not too bad off if they must lay as close as they possibly can to one another.  These girls never cease to entertain! -Carrie

2 comments:

  1. Ya'll have really had it bad. We "only" got to 100 today, but I was thankful the humidity is down. Your poor chickens. Mine have taken to standing in one of the water dishes to cool off their feet!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Nice Blog! Well most of your content and image is original and informative. /many thanks for sharing this, cheers.
    Scrum Process

    ReplyDelete