Enjoy a little light summer fun with your chickens. I don't think I will be buying mine a kiddy pool. Enjoy Anice
Can Chickens Swim? All You Need To Know
I must admit, this question had really never entered my head – I assumed they don’t!If, like me, you also assumed chickens don’t swim, you’re not alone. It appears most people think chicken can’t swim either.
In the normal course of the day you can watch your chicken drink water, perhaps paddle her feet if she’s hot, but swim? Surely not!
Well, as it happens they can swim, but mostly they choose not to, for reasons that we will explore shortly.
Keep reading to learn how chickens swim and importantly, if you should let your chickens swim and the health implications.
Are Chickens Built For Swimming?
To understand if chickens can swim I thought it was best to compare them to a similar sized bird that loves to swim: a duck.Ducks are built to swim:
- They have powerful webbed feet to propel them
- They have waterproof feathers
- Able to ‘right’ themselves in water
Ducks also secrete oil from special glands which they coat their feathers with, this makes their feathers ‘waterproof’.
- No webbed feet
- Feathers are not waterproof
- Lack the ability to ‘right’ themselves in water
So it appears that chickens do have an innate ability to swim. It seems that it is built into their survival system from long ago; it is not a skill they frequently use.
Their feathers are not waterproof, they do not secrete the oil that ducks do – once they get sodden wet the chicken will sink like a stone. They should never be left alone near water that is deep enough for them to drown in.
If your chicken should accidentally fall into the pool and manage to get out, she will need to be dried off quickly especially if the air is cool. They can easily get hypothermia and die.
Something that will affect how well the chicken will swim (or not) is the panic factor. While many birds will stay calm, some will panic and can easily drown. Indeed, it has been recorded that chickens have drowned in a bucket of water (it wasn’t recorded how they got there).
Chickens that are of a calm disposition are likely to do better at swimming that those who are high strung.
Like people, no two chickens are alike and what one may take in their stride another will have a meltdown over.
Should Chickens Go in Pools?
Whilst researching this article, I saw lots of videos of chickens in swimming pools.There are several videos on social media showing hens floating and swimming in family pools – the birds seem content to just sit and float!
It is questionable whether or not we should be exposing our chickens to pool chemicals.
In order to keep pools clean and sanitary, barrages of chemicals are added to the water: sanitizers, oxidizers, algaecides, clarifiers and enzymes. How these chemicals might affect a chicken floating around in it we don’t know. I do know it will kill frogs….
If you must let your chickens float or swim, I would suggest a small child’s pool with natural water and some sort of stepping out area just in case the hen needs to exit quickly.
Many folk who keep both ducks and chickens together, keep a small kids paddling pool ready for the ducks.
As a precaution against a chicken falling in the water they place bricks or concrete blocks around the bottom of the pool so the hen can have something to step on and exit the pool easily.
Another idea is a ramp up to and down into the water – again the idea is to provide an exit for any bird or animal in the water.
It should go without saying, if you put a chicken in the pool with you, don’t leave it unsupervised – treat it like a small child and monitor its swimming. If the bird appears to be getting distressed, take it out and dry it off, remember, chickens can catch a chill and die from being soaked.
Summary
Now that we have determined that chickens possess the ability to swim – either for pleasure or to escape (more likely), we need to remember to watch over them when they do venture near water.While it may be fun for us to have cute videos of the chicken swimming with the kids, we should remember that water is not a natural environment for this bird. If the hen doesn’t want to swim, don’t make it – be kind.
