HOUSING OF POULTRY 173 



temperature may not be felt so soon inside the warm 

 house; but there is something else that makes houses cold. 

 The thermometer does not always tell us how cold we feel. 

 It does not always tell us how warm we feel. Dampness 

 in the air in the summer intensifies the heat. 



A house cannot be both warm and dry in cold weather 

 without artificial heat. "Why? During the day the sun 

 strikes through the windows and raises the temperature 

 inside. At night the heat will escape through the glass. 

 The temperature will fall rapidly at night. There will 

 be a great difference between night and day temperature. 

 Now, warm air holds more moisture than cold air. During 

 the day with a high temperature the air will be relatively 

 dry ; at night it will be relatively damp though the same 

 amount of moisture may be in the air. If the temper- 

 ature falls low enough the moisture in the air will con- 

 dense on the walls. Moisture or frost on the walls indi- 

 cates that the air in the room is as damp as it can be ; in 

 other words it is totally saturated. It also means that the 

 house is cold, otherwise it would not condense. A warm 

 house that is at the same time dry in cold weather without 

 artificial heat, is an impossible proposition. 



A damp house is a cold house. Chickens can stand cold 

 air, but not cold damp air. By opening the windows 

 during the day we keep down the temperature of the 

 house and this keeps the air drier. Dampness on the 

 walls indicates that the air is damp, not that the walls were 

 damp. The moisture in the air condenses on the cold 

 walls. Dampness is taken out of the air and put on the 

 walls. The moisture was taken into the air during the 

 day when the temperature went up, and at night as the 

 temperature falls the capacity of the air to hold the 

 moisture decreases and is condensed on the walls. With 

 more ventilation this moisture would escape. "With such 



