Chickens can play dead when hunted

Have your chickens played dead

  • My chicken(s) have played dead ☠️

  • My chicken(s) haven’t played dead ☠️

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:welcome

As other posters has already said, they were most likely in shock. I've had dogs attack my flock before, and I've seen my whole flock change instantly. They'll go places that I've never imagined they'd go and freeze up like they are dead themselves. (Put yourself in their position. Those dogs coming in killing off all your flock mates is like a shooter coming into your school.) For some of my birds, it took a day or two for them to recover from the horror. For other people's flocks, I've seen it take them a long time to recover, if they ever do.
I would definitely check them over for injuries. The first place I would look is their tails. Oftentimes the dog will pull out the chicken's tail feathers as the chickens are trying to get away. (The chickens will automatically drop these feathers as a survival technique.) Then I'd move to their backs, then the rest of their body (legs, thighs, wings, etc.).
I recommend keeping the survivors somewhere where they cannot see the dogs. Believe it or not, but chickens do suffer from PTSD, and may still panic at the distant sight of your dogs months after the attack. (I know this from my own experience after my hen was attacked by a neighbor's dog.)
 
Kiki said:
Welcome to BYC. The ones playing dead might be hurt internally.
Are they up and eating and drinking water?
Can you take a video of how they are playing dead or up and walking now?
Click to expand...
Yes, they are alive and jumping on to the roosting bars of their coop. They are eating and drinking but they don’t play dead on que soon I will post a video of them. I recently got 10 more chickens so they can have more friends.
 

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