Chicken staying in her coop

[crazybantams]

Hi


I have 5 bantams and a regular large hybrid hen, we recently rescued a chicken from a friend, it had become stuck in a fence, was injured and the others had badly attacked it and it would not reintegrate. At first all was fine, but we soon realised it was actually a young cockerel. Whilst we tried to make alternative arrangements for him we noticed he was interested in the hybrid large hen (No probs there) and the only one of our bantams that is laying ( the rest are too young at the moment), unfortunately the bantam that's in lay is a bit lame ( she was also a rescue, and is 'wonky' on one side) she tried frantically to avoid him but he was chasing her round all the time. He made a swift exist from the flock after we realised this and she was in quite a bad way. He has been gone a couple of days now but she will still stay in the coop nest box, she isnt preening, and has stopped laying but when we make her come out of the coop she will eat and drink. The others are also giving her a hard time as well now and she is back to limping on one side with her lame leg, whereas this had practically gone before and she was strong and sturdy. We have considered moving into an isolation cage and keeping her warm and away from the others for a while but worried that the shock of going back to the cold and in with the others will be just as bad, also concerned that the pecking order has been messed with quite allot recently and disrupting it again may only prolong the bad times.

Desperately want for our happy healthy flock to get back on track again.

Any tips or advice?

 

[sourland]

As long as she is getting enough to eat and drink and the flock is not causing physical damage to her, I would leave her with the flock. To remove and later reintroduce her may cause far more serious bullying problems.

 

[crazybantams]

This is what we have been thinking. We are another 2 days on and she is still spending most of the time inside the coop and when we get her out she is being given a bit of a hard time, nothing that bad though we have had worse when establishing pecking order. I'm starting to think is she sick? She doesn't seem to be, only had chickens a couple of years but she doesn't seem to have any symptoms. The next decision to make is if we lock her out of the coop so she can't get in there during the day, there are other sheltered areas to keep out of any rain. We are mostly just worried she is cold and wants to get away but don't want this becoming just what she does?

 

[crazybantams]

Also thanks for the advice!