Greenleaf Farms

Water plays a highly important part in plant and animal life. It is a chemical constituent of feedstuffs, fowls, and eggs and constitutes from 55 to 78 per cent of the live weight of chickens.

Young birds, like young plants, have higher moisture content than older ones as water softens and hydrolyzes feed in the processes of digestion.  That is important as  they don't have large enough mouths to swallow feed, hence why chick feed is always more pulverized than layer.

Water carries digested food to all parts of the body and waste products to the points of elimination. It  controls the  body temperature by absorbing the heat of cell reactions and by vaporizing moisture for excretion by way of the air sacs and lungs. It also serves as a lubricant for joints, muscles, and other body tissues. Water generally constitutes from 5 to 12 per cent of air-dried grains and other feedstuff fed to poultry.

It is also formed in the body as an end product of the oxidation or burning of digested food, because of this a liberal quantity of water or liquid milk, which is about 90 per cent water, should be kept before poultry at all times.