Summer heat often reduces feed intake in your flock. This causes severe nutrient deficiencies. Chicks and pullets may fail to reach standard weight and shank length. Laying hens also suffer from weight loss and produce lighter eggs. To fix this, you need effective poultry heat stress management.
1. Boosting Pullet Growth and Uniformity
First, sort your pullets and manage the underweight birds separately. You can increase the nutrient density for these smaller birds. Simply add more soybean meal and premix to their diet.
Next, introduce a midnight feeding session. Turn on the lights for one hour. Do this exactly four hours after lights out. Ensure the troughs have enough feed for a midnight snack.
You should also add high-quality plant oil to the feed. Never use cheap, recycled gutter oil. Plant oil provides extra energy to boost weight. It also helps birds absorb fat-soluble vitamins for better bone growth.
If pullets remain underweight, delay their light stimulation. You should also postpone their pre-lay oil vaccines.
2. Restoring Weight in Laying Hens
Laying hens face even worse weight loss in summer. Tracking Hy-Line Brown layers shows a massive difference. Birds can lose up to 0.5 pounds between winter and summer. This drop represents about 20% of a hen’s total body weight.
Egg weight correlates directly with body weight. You must restore the hen’s body weight to improve egg size. Proper poultry heat stress management solves this problem.
You can use the same recovery methods applied to pullets. Implement the one-hour midnight feeding session. Mix high-quality plant oil into their daily feed. These simple poultry heat stress management steps will restore flock health quickly.
