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We’ve left our five-month-old-ish chickens outside in the rain. They don’t appear to want to go back to the shelter of the coop, and they aren’t huddling under trees, or anything, just rooting around in the grass for bugs and plants, as usual.

Is this okay? Going by human logic, they’d catch a cold, but it probably doesn’t work this way for chickens. So is it okay to leave them out in the rain; will they be okay? Do they need to go undercover in heavy rain, and are they smart enough to do it by themselves in the event?

Thanks!

Fivesideddice
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2 Answers2

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My Mum had chickens as she was a child by her parents. She told me a lot of times that she could see how the weather will be because of the chickens.

If the weather will be rainy chickens have a greasy secretion that they will cover their feathers with. They go with their pecker through the feathers and distribute this secretion. So if you see this before the rain begins, you not have to be worried about them, they are "waterproof" then.

Allerleirauh
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Chickens have more sense than most people realize. They seem to enjoy a light to moderate rain (and the worms and bugs that come to surface when it rains), and they know enough to find cover when it rains too heavily for their comfort. There is a very helpful discussion of chickens in the rain on the Community Chickens website: https://www.communitychickens.com/chickens-in-the-rain/

Tom Gaskill
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