Picking the best chickens for hot weather is a crucial step to keeping a successful flock. We humans can head into the air conditioning or take a swim in the pool to cool off. Chickens rely on adaptations and behavior to make it through hot weather and to stay cool and some breeds are better at it than others. So, if you live in an area that experiences hot weather, it’s best to pick chickens that can handle the rising mercury!
Our Breed Selector Tool Can Help!
If picking the best chickens for hot weather proves tough since there are so many choices, My Pet Chicken can help! Our Breed Selector Tool can help you narrow things down. Here you can input chicken attributes that are important to you. It includes everything from heat-hardiness to cold tolerance, broodiness, egg-laying ability, size, egg color, and rarity. The selector tool will calculate your answers and give you a list with breeds that match.
Colored Egg Layers
Colorful egg baskets are popular and these two varieties will keep yours full of green and blue eggs. The Olive Egger and Easter Egger are both hybrid birds that are hardy, friendly, and good egg layers. Because these are designer birds, they come in lots of color options from Partridge Olive Eggers to Snowy White, Green Queen, and Blue Easter Eggers.
Leghorns
While there are lots of breeds that do well in hot weather, the best hot weather breed award has to go to the Leghorn. This famous breed (remember the cartoon Foghorn Leghorn!) originated in the Mediterranean, so it’s no stranger to hot weather and its body is built to handle the heat. The Leghorn’s distinctive large floppy comb and large wattles allow body heat to circulate, be exposed to the air, and cool before reentering the body. These white egg-laying birds are at the top of the list of best chickens for hot weather. They are available in three varieties: White, Light Brown and Exchequer. The White is the most prolific layer of the three (they can lay almost every day of the week) but the other two varieties aren’t far behind.
Brown Egg Layers
If brown eggs are a must-have along with hot weather tolerance, there are plenty of breeds to fit this bill. Below are two fan favorites:
Plymouth Rock – The popular Barred Rock is available in large fowl and bantam varieties and is one of the most popular dual-purpose chickens on small farms today. They’re very friendly and great layers of large brown eggs. Other varieties are White, Partridge, and Silver Penciled. No matter the variety, this American breed does well in hot and cold weather.
Welsummer – This dark brown egg layer came to American via Holland and is available in large fowl and bantam sizes. They are famous for their deep reddish-brown egg color; many of the eggs are also speckled! Welsummers are good foragers meaning you’ll save on feed if you allow them to range freely!
As you’re picking your new flock members, be sure to keep the best chickens for hot weather in mind. They will provide a solid base for a happy and healthy flock.
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