Chicken tunneling….

[PoppasGrill]

Like a scene from Hogan’s Hero’s, our chicks ,7 weeks, started scratching at the ground at the side of the coop facing the coop that the big girls are in. In a surprisingly short time, with help from the hens on the outside, they had a hole deep enough to almost wiggle through. We took a shovel and filled it back in from both sides of the fence, while looking at the big hens and quoting Cool Hand Luke,” Why you got your dirt on my ground…?” They immediately starting scratching in the same spot , not sure if was to help with the escape attempt, because the dirt isn’t packed tight, or just that they watched us put dirt there and wanted to see if any goodies were in the new dirt.
Even though it looks like a coordinated effort from both sides, I’m thinking / hoping it was a coincidence that they chose that spot on either side of the fence.
When asked the Turkeys stated “ I saw nothing..NOTHING…!!”

 

[Insnesnakos]

Sounds like they want to dig into the big girl coop! Send some pics if you can, I really want to see how it looks

 

[Ridgerunner]

If you are feeding them scratch or something for them to eat on that ground to get them used to being next to each other, that would explain the scratching. That's a common strategy on this forum. I really doubt it is a coordinated escape attempt. Chickens can be fairly intelligent in some circumstances but that should be beyond them.

For whatever reason they are scratching there I'd suggest you put something down they cannot scratch through. That could be wire like chicken wire or hardware cloth, maybe pavers or boards. That should take care if it.

 

[aart]

Chickens can be master excavators:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/excavation-by-birds-a-word-of-warning.1086535/

 

[PoppasGrill]

If you are feeding them scratch or something for them to eat on that ground to get them used to being next to each other, that would explain the scratching. That's a common strategy on this forum. I really doubt it is a coordinated escape attempt. Chickens can be fairly intelligent in some circumstances but that should be beyond them.

For whatever reason they are scratching there I'd suggest you put something down they cannot scratch through. That could be wire like chicken wire or hardware cloth, maybe pavers or boards. That should take care if it.

Treated lumber is 4-6” underground as our base for the coop/run. We don’t put scratch down as the big hens are free range and go in and out of the coop regularly for the nesting boxes in the coop.
We saw the hole there and started making jokes about the “escape attempt” , thought it was funny that it looked like they were trying to help the lil ones get out. we plan on integrating them next weekend as they’ve been in look-don’t touch for 2 weeks.