Disturbing hen behavior, strange flock dynamics - please help.

[littledog]

Hi folks, I need some help figuring out what is going on and what to do about it. Sorry in advance for the length, but I have to give some background first:

We started with 2 hens who got along well, Molly the boss hen/best layer and Lucy the little hen, also a good layer. They lived in peace and harmony, and layed lots of eggs. In early Spring, we got 3 chicks, and when they were 2 months old we got a rooster who was the same age. We put the 3 pullets and baby rooster together (after proper quarantine) with a divider in the run so the 4 youngsters could get acquainted with the 2 adults, but eat and roost separately. The 3 pullets and baby rooster got along great, Molly the boss hen was not a big fan of the rooster but she tolerated him as long as he let her be boss, and Lucy the little hen was unconcerned. After 2 weeks we took out the divider, but left the little coop in the run so the youngsters could hide there if needed. We let them out to free range on weekends. Everybody still got along fine, occasionally Molly would chase at rooster, but never peck or really attack.

Soon they were all roosting together in the big coop, the 3 pullets started laying eggs and became hens, and baby rooster grew tail feathers, started crowing and mating the hens, and became Ragnar Lothbroek (extra cookies if you watch Vikings) Ragnar was never very aggressive with the hens - he jumps on them to mate, but never grabs or pecks. He always defers to the hens when there are extra treats, he even sits on the eggs occasionally.

A week ago, Molly the boss hen/best layer, had a horrible wound on the back of her neck. She's currently hospitalized in the chick house in our laundry room, and recovering very well, thanks to all the wonderful information on wound treatment I learned here!

We never saw what happened, and at first we were guessing - maybe Ragnar did it. Did he finally decide to fight her for the right to be boss? Did she refuse to mate with him, so he grabbed her by the neck? He has never shown any aggression towards the hens or us, but maybe he needed to assert his new roosterness?

But now, after observing the flock for a week without Molly there, we're thinking we might have judged Ragnar unfairly, and the culprit might be Natalie, the young barred-rock hen who just started laying. She follows Ragnar around constantly, and pulls feathers out of his neck. She never shows aggression when she does this, just stares at his neck for a second, then grabs a feather. Then does it again. And again. She never stops, she is relentless! Poor Ragnar never retaliates, he tries to do his duty to mate all the hens and protect them while free-ranging, but we can tell he's really bugged by her. His poor neck is so plucked, he is starting to look like a turkey. And the other hens are tired of having no peace, they are constantly getting out of the way and hiding, while Natalie chases Ragnar around the coop to pluck his feathers. Natalie never picks on any of the other hens. We're still not sure if she is the one who pecked Molly's neck to a bloody pulp, but the other hens would never do that and Ragnar comes across as a good citizen of the flock.

All of you more experienced flock-meisters, can you tell me if I'm wrong? If not, why Natalie is doing this? Maybe she wants to be flock-boss, and she's trying to take down her superiors, one-by-one. Maybe she's lacking something in her nutrition that makes her attracted to feathers (except she doesn't eat them, they're scattered all over the run.) Maybe she is a sociopathic hen who is mentally disturbed?!

Natalie's a beautiful hen who's turning out to be a good layer, and I'd prefer to keep her, but the eggs she lays are not worth the discord in my coop. I'll cull her if that's what it takes to keep peace in my flock. Please tell me about all your experiences with your pecky hens, and what you think I should do.

 

[The Yakima Kid]

Hi folks, I need some help figuring out what is going on and what to do about it. Sorry in advance for the length, but I have to give some background first:

We started with 2 hens who got along well, Molly the boss hen/best layer and Lucy the little hen, also a good layer. They lived in peace and harmony, and layed lots of eggs. In early Spring, we got 3 chicks, and when they were 2 months old we got a rooster who was the same age. We put the 3 pullets and baby rooster together (after proper quarantine) with a divider in the run so the 4 youngsters could get acquainted with the 2 adults, but eat and roost separately. The 3 pullets and baby rooster got along great, Molly the boss hen was not a big fan of the rooster but she tolerated him as long as he let her be boss, and Lucy the little hen was unconcerned. After 2 weeks we took out the divider, but left the little coop in the run so the youngsters could hide there if needed. We let them out to free range on weekends. Everybody still got along fine, occasionally Molly would chase at rooster, but never peck or really attack.

Soon they were all roosting together in the big coop, the 3 pullets started laying eggs and became hens, and baby rooster grew tail feathers, started crowing and mating the hens, and became Ragnar Lothbroek (extra cookies if you watch Vikings) Ragnar was never very aggressive with the hens - he jumps on them to mate, but never grabs or pecks. He always defers to the hens when there are extra treats, he even sits on the eggs occasionally.

A week ago, Molly the boss hen/best layer, had a horrible wound on the back of her neck. She's currently hospitalized in the chick house in our laundry room, and recovering very well, thanks to all the wonderful information on wound treatment I learned here!

We never saw what happened, and at first we were guessing - maybe Ragnar did it. Did he finally decide to fight her for the right to be boss? Did she refuse to mate with him, so he grabbed her by the neck? He has never shown any aggression towards the hens or us, but maybe he needed to assert his new roosterness?

But now, after observing the flock for a week without Molly there, we're thinking we might have judged Ragnar unfairly, and the culprit might be Natalie, the young barred-rock hen who just started laying. She follows Ragnar around constantly, and pulls feathers out of his neck. She never shows aggression when she does this, just stares at his neck for a second, then grabs a feather. Then does it again. And again. She never stops, she is relentless! Poor Ragnar never retaliates, he tries to do his duty to mate all the hens and protect them while free-ranging, but we can tell he's really bugged by her. His poor neck is so plucked, he is starting to look like a turkey. And the other hens are tired of having no peace, they are constantly getting out of the way and hiding, while Natalie chases Ragnar around the coop to pluck his feathers. Natalie never picks on any of the other hens. We're still not sure if she is the one who pecked Molly's neck to a bloody pulp, but the other hens would never do that and Ragnar comes across as a good citizen of the flock.

All of you more experienced flock-meisters, can you tell me if I'm wrong? If not, why Natalie is doing this? Maybe she wants to be flock-boss, and she's trying to take down her superiors, one-by-one. Maybe she's lacking something in her nutrition that makes her attracted to feathers (except she doesn't eat them, they're scattered all over the run.) Maybe she is a sociopathic hen who is mentally disturbed?!

Natalie's a beautiful hen who's turning out to be a good layer, and I'd prefer to keep her, but the eggs she lays are not worth the discord in my coop. I'll cull her if that's what it takes to keep peace in my flock. Please tell me about all your experiences with your pecky hens, and what you think I should do.

One common suggestion will be lack of space. Others will suggest boredom. You can try feeding her a little yogurt for about three days and see if the increase in protein in salt changes her behavior, and you can try putting a swing in the run, and hanging a shiny pie pan or two.

All too often it isn't clear why it happens. You may need to rehome or eat her. I don't know what breeds the others are; but I know in my own backyard I have a feather puller that I need to make a decision about - I've put it off because no one is naked or bleeding yet.

 

[chooks4life]

We never saw what happened, and at first we were guessing - maybe Ragnar did it. Did he finally decide to fight her for the right to be boss? Did she refuse to mate with him, so he grabbed her by the neck? He has never shown any aggression towards the hens or us, but maybe he needed to assert his new roosterness?

If Ragnar fought Molly, the wounds would be to the breast and belly area as they kick there when fighting, and you'd possibly see minor peck wounds around the face/comb/wattles as well. If he attacked and bullied a chook who wasn't fighting, then you'd get wounds to the back of the body and head, but this sort of incident is basically unheard of from a rooster who has otherwise acted normal.

I believe your guess is right --- it's almost certainly Natalie.

Even if he grabbed the neck skin or feathers in attempting to hold on to mount, such a wound is very, very unlikely to result; no wound is far more likely than even a tiny scratch. At no point will a socially and mentally healthy/normal rooster savage a hen, but that said it's unfortunately common for many roosters to mix mating and fighting due to confused instincts, due to poultry keeping methods including practicing gender segregation from hatching onwards. They don't hatch with a perfect understanding of their gender, or the other gender, or their respective social roles, much of that is learned from mother and father in the wild/natural familial social unit.

Chickens of either gender, when prevented from living within a normal social unit (hens, roosters and chicks all together) will both exhibit behaviors normally shown by the opposite sex, as well as those normally shown by their own sex, and this causes violence to appear in interactions which normally would never involve conflict. Males and females will not only fight their own gender, as is normal, but will also mate their own gender, which causes conflict when they are later introduced to the other gender. Chooks with such recent backgrounds ancestrally can fail to be socially cohesive with the opposite gender due to this issue.

If you develop a breed in complete absence of normal familial structure for enough generations they lose those social instincts, and even when you put them back into normal social structures, it can take several generations to recover those instincts.

Roosters and hens do not naturally compete with one another. Alpha rooster spot and alpha hen spot are complimentary, they do not compete with one another for those spots unless socially abnormal. I have had one rooster before who thought he should be alpha hen... Had to get rid of him, he was fighting hens all the time, lol. That should never be tolerated in my opinion, kicks to the breast/belly area are what their species is designed to cope with, and their combination of extensive breast muscle and fused skeleton affords them far more protection there, but kicks to the sides and rear can easily (and often do) break the forming eggs within the hens, causing internal lacerations, hemorrhage, and excruciating and slow deaths. There is no natural protection against application of force to the sides of a hen's abdomen, no bone or significant muscle protecting her internal organs and reproductive system, and at no point is it normal for her to be kicked there, and that's exactly what 'hen-fight-breaking-up' roosters do.

Some people think it's normal for a rooster to leap into every henfight but it's not. The fight between two hens does not naturally involve any other party; it's a hierarchy dispute between them and all a 'third wheel' will do is attack them in the sides, likely causing far more damage than their own dispute would, while they are facing off with each other. If you (or an animal) constantly interferes in a social dispute between two other individuals, the issue is prevented from coming to its natural and swift conclusion, postponed, not solved, and this causes escalating levels of violence with both competitors becoming more and more frustrated every time they clash, until what would have been a mild 'a-few-kicks-and-it's-solved' kind of dispute becomes fatal.

But now, after observing the flock for a week without Molly there, we're thinking we might have judged Ragnar unfairly, and the culprit might be Natalie, the young barred-rock hen who just started laying. She follows Ragnar around constantly, and pulls feathers out of his neck. She never shows aggression when she does this, just stares at his neck for a second, then grabs a feather. Then does it again. And again. She never stops, she is relentless!

Most feather pecking is indeed obsessive, not aggressive. It has a strong genetic basis, and BRs are one breed noted for it, though not all strains or family lines of BRs have that trait as far as I know.

Cannibalism is not an automatic behavior all chickens exhibit when low in protein, only some will do that, and there are breeds noted for that predisposition. Others, without that predisposition to viewing others as food, will literally starve to death before harming another chicken. I know, you've probably heard that 'cannibalism is just a sign they need more protein'. That's not true though hunger can trigger cannibalistic behavior in predisposed chooks.

Chicks with the tendency for cannibalism will also act on it without being hungry, I've seen chicks fresh from hatching begin cannibalizing other chicks which are still hatching, pulling them out of the eggs, trying to disembowel them. They're still running on their yolk supply at that stage, not going to experience a need for food for another two days minimum.

I won't tolerate that trait in my flock. Feather picking could be considered 'gateway' or preliminary behavior to cannibalism, as it's part of the same mental process. It is not a normal part of every chicken mentality to view others of its kind as living food buffets. I culled that trait out so when I have an injured bird I know it will be unmolested even if left with the rest of the flock. Bullying and negative social traits are strongly heritable... The only people who will tell you otherwise are people who believe both are inevitable and whom have both traits in their flock, generally.

All of you more experienced flock-meisters, can you tell me if I'm wrong? If not, why Natalie is doing this? Maybe she wants to be flock-boss, and she's trying to take down her superiors, one-by-one.

This is not how they challenge superiors; the very fact that they are not responding like it's a challenge reveals that they know she's not challenging them and she's not mentally right. This is a chook with a mental defect trying to consume her flock mates. At this stage all she knows is that when she pulls out feathers, sometimes tasty blood appears. Blood is merely a liquid tissue by classification, it's protein and nutrition in liquid form.

It only takes a few lessons for a chicken to learn how to obtain a high value feed source reliably, whether that's learning how to break into an egg or another chicken. They can, and do, learn just by watching others, as well. Sooner or later it's quite probable that she will discover that if she applies more violence, blood will be guaranteed every time, and even flesh. She's a serious liability and once she gets started on a victim, there's a very good chance any other latent cannibals you have will join right in.

At least she's not going for their eyes... Yet, anyway. She might never do that, they appear to have fixations on either eyes, feet, combs, feathers, vents, or other specific parts, not all of them at once or all of those fixation points in the same individual. Some breeds are noted for specific fixations i.e. Leghorns and feet-pecking.

If the other chickens thought she was challenging them, they would turn, face her, and spar. Ripping out feathers is not part of the average normal hierarchy conflict between socially balanced/normal chickens of either gender --- they will pose, usually vocalize threats at one another, kick one another a few times, sometimes only once, and that alone is enough to show them who's alpha out of the two, and it's settled (often permanently) and they will respect their social positions peacefully from then onwards, generally. There is no need for most fights to descend into ripping feathers out and using spurs or causing injuries, even between roosters. Some individuals are far more aggressive than others, again this is a very strongly genetic trait and if you cull it out you won't have to deal with the injured or dying aftermath of owning and breeding such individuals.

Almost all excessively aggressive individuals are bullies, not known for restraining their violence to animals or people who are challenging them, and not known for showing mercy or natural restraint when victory is achieved or submissive behavior shown.

Maybe she's lacking something in her nutrition that makes her attracted to feathers (except she doesn't eat them, they're scattered all over the run.) Maybe she is a sociopathic hen who is mentally disturbed?!

Unfortunately that's basically it, sorry, she's mentally abnormal. She's not after the feathers, she's after the flesh of her fellow chickens. If it was only the feathers she was after, then you could guesstimate she might need more copper, sulfur, silica, protein, etc.

Natalie's a beautiful hen who's turning out to be a good layer, and I'd prefer to keep her, but the eggs she lays are not worth the discord in my coop. I'll cull her if that's what it takes to keep peace in my flock. Please tell me about all your experiences with your pecky hens, and what you think I should do.

I culled against all signs of cannibalism so never had an issue with it; I really recommend that since if you breed your own replacements, well, noncannibals almost never produce cannibals, it's one way to massively decrease the incidence of cannibalism. It takes, as a general rule of thumb, 7 generations to breed a trait in or out, but you can massively decrease incidence of any given trait by culling out individuals known to carry it, of course. Alternatively, if you knew how to rehab a chook for social/mental defects, you could prevent her, and her offspring, and their offspring (etc) from acting on it for 7 generations, minimum of 5, and there's a decent chance the trait would be at the very least significantly weakened, possibly gone, from the 7th generation and on.

Since she's not yet made the mental leap to understanding how to obtain flesh/blood every time, you may be able to rehab her... I personally wouldn't bother, but many would. It is after all a common problem. You could use those goggles/spectacles sold for exactly that purpose, or cage her separately, or add more protein and general nutrients to the diet (additional nutrition is almost always necessary for flocks on the average layer ration anyway)... Obviously debeaking should not be considered a humane method of control but plenty of folks do that too. Some people use red lighting, but that suits a battery hen setup which I'm sure your other hens are glad to live without...

I would consider it very serious that you already had a chook with a serious wound. If she happens to be on the nest at such a time as another hen is laying an egg, and she sees the vent during the process, things could get ugly as she'd go into a rapid feeding frenzy and more damage could be done in seconds than can be repaired, you could end up culling other hens for the sake of keeping her. At this rate scalping the others is more likely than vent pecking but she is mentally bent and I'd either cage her separately or be rid of her, personally.

Best wishes.

 

[The Yakima Kid]

Everything you wrote is true. Which is why I need to make a decision about our one Dominique girl who has taken to feather pulling.

The heritability is why I won't have a white Leghorn on the place.

 

[The Yakima Kid]

Chooks4Life is absolutely correct on vent picking. A vent picker will disembowel another hen and kill her.

Another thing is that I have used beak trimming on birds with bad habits. I take a very small piece off the top beak only. It will grow back. The idea is to take the tip off so they can't peck or get a good grip on the other birds skin. A very sharp toenail clipper suffices.

Some biddies give up after discovering that they are firing blanks; others may need retrims. Some need to be kept trimmed throughout their entire lives. You weigh the damage she can do versus the suffering she undergoes from being trimmed. The suffering of her victims should always have priority, and she might make a fine dish of chicken and dumplings.

Whatever you do, do NOT permit her to reproduce.

I'm afraid I'm a gutless wimp - I didn't want to get into heritability because although cannibalism and feather picking are highly heritable, there is a malignant chorus of those who refuse to believe this and attack anyone who acknowledges the problem, and I just didn't want an argument.

 

[chooks4life]

X2 on the beak trimming... It's not the same thing as debeaking. I've had hens I bought in who had been debeaked until they had nothing beyond the nostrils, it's cruel. Beak trimming is not the same thing.

I've trimmed beaks, using nail-clippers, to break the learned habit of egg eating; once they lose that sharp nerveless edge from the top of the upper beak, they've got too little hard tip to use to apply force without hurting themselves --- much like when you cut a fingernail slightly too close and it doesn't bleed or hurt by itself, but has a dull pain when you try to pinch something hard with it.

Unlike true debeaking it will of course grow back. In the meantime they eat, drink, preen normally, it's not harmful, basically like clipping your dogs' claws or your own nails isn't harmful unless you cut too deep.

I didn't suggest that before, because I didn't think it would necessarily stop her picking feathers, but it might. It will stop her picking flesh if she gets past the feathers, though... If you want to try to rehab, not cull, that can be a tool you can use to control her habit.

Best wishes.

 

[littledog]

Thanks to both of you, Yakima and Chooks, I've learned a lot from you both. Tonight we sequestered Natalie to another pen from the rest of the flock, and put a hood over Ragnar's neck ( made out of a childrens' sock, and will do the same for Molly once she's healthy enough to go back out to the run) Once Molly, with her hood, is healed enough to go back into the coop, we'll assess if Natalie deserves to go back in the coop with the others, but if she still picks and pecks on her friends, we'll eat her. And definitely not raise her eggs.
Sorry for that - we've had other barred-rock hens in the past who were very nice hens and good layers, but I guess when we get chicks from a hatchery it's kind of like a puppy mill - they're purebred, but that means nothing when it comes to their temperament.

 

[The Yakima Kid]

Thanks to both of you, Yakima and Chooks, I've learned a lot from you both. Tonight we sequestered Natalie to another pen from the rest of the flock, and put a hood over Ragnar's neck ( made out of a childrens' sock, and will do the same for Molly once she's healthy enough to go back out to the run) Once Molly, with her hood, is healed enough to go back into the coop, we'll assess if Natalie deserves to go back in the coop with the others, but if she still picks and pecks on her friends, we'll eat her. And definitely not raise her eggs.
Sorry for that - we've had other barred-rock hens in the past who were very nice hens and good layers, but I guess when we get chicks from a hatchery it's kind of like a puppy mill - they're purebred, but that means nothing when it comes to their temperament.

Some hatchery chicks are actually excellent as utility birds; and even some breeder strains have nasty individuals.

 

[chooks4life]

Sounds like you're doing all you can do.

Again X2 on what Yakima Kid said, it's always the family line not the breed, no matter what trait you're talking about; some traits just crop up more often among family lines raised under certain environmental situations, i.e. neurotic and aggressive behavior being far more common among intensively caged and socially disordered/isolated birds.

People often tend to overgeneralize i.e. 'all Buff Orps are good mothers' or 'all Leghorns are too noisy' (I've probably said the last one myself, or something close to it)... But again it's just family line. Some of those rates of occurrence can be very high though, so high you can end up giving up on the breed sometimes.

Best wishes.

 

[littledog]

Thanks, that's good to keep in mind.