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Now I know the obvious answer is build a fence, but my garden is very large and the fence building takes time and a lot of money. There is already a wire fence there but in places it is falling down and there are gaps. On the other side of the fence is a popular dog walking path, which obviously...

So it's been raining for months now and my chicken run has completely turned to mud. I was holding off doing anything as I thought the rain must stop at some point, but no. It smells really bad and because the hens are carrying mud around with them the eggs are filthy. The run is covered by a...

A couple of months ago now I added 5 new pullets to my flock of 4 hens. They were a little smaller at the time but have now grown to roughly the same size as the older birds. When I let them out on a morning, all of them go for the feeder but after a few seconds the older ones go for the new...

I have an old flock of 4 hens just over a year old. 2 days ago I added 5 younger smaller birds a few weeks away from laying. I know for a few days they are going to fight, when they are a distance from each other they are OK but if one of the smaller ones strays too close to the big girls there...

When I am out with my hens I don't see (or I don't think I do) any signs of who is top of the pecking order. I sort of have an idea of who it is, but what are the signs? It may be helpful when I add my new pullets in a few weeks.

My coop is a converted shed with one window, but the window is sheltered by a little awning extending from the roof. I was told that if there were too many windows it would act like a greenhouse and be too hot. Will enough light be getting in for them to see properly getting in on a night? They...

I recently built my girls a new coop converted from a shed. I put in a couple of roosting bars at different heights, the higher one being a foot higher than the lower one. But they only seem to want to use the lower one. I have tried for the last few nights lifting them on to the higher bar but...

My hens are 1 year and a couple of months old and just recently have started pecking and chasing each other around their pen. It has never been a problem before until recently. I have noticed a few have lost feathers around their vents and this seems to be where most of the pecking is done. A...

I have recently gained a few additions to my flock in the way of chicks, so will need a new coop eventually to accommodate the new girls. I am planning to convert a shed as my new coop. Is an overlap cladded shed sufficient if I put boards around the bottom so there are no gaps and add a hatch...

One of my new chicks has a problem with one of its legs. At the hock its left leg sticks out sideways and its toes seem to just hang. It hobbles around on its hock leaning to that side and is already smaller than the rest of the brood. What is the diagnosis and best and most humane solution?

A few weeks ago one of my pullets died, and I found blood around the vent when I inspected her. Now I have another girl with blood and sore skin around her vent. I noticed that the other girls were chasing her around pecking at it, but then I saw that she was pulling at her own feathers too. I...

I went out to lock the girls up last night to find Doris laid on her side dead under the roost bars. She had blood around her vent and there was a bloody egg in the box. Was this just stress from laying an egg?

One of my girls just started laying the other day, quite a while after the others. She used to be quiet and just follow the other 5 about. There were two other girls who were a bit mouthy but not too bad. Since she started laying she never shuts up while I am around. I tried giving them treats...

Every so often I go to let my chickens out for the day and one of them has laid an egg on the floor of the coop. I have a few who lay their eggs before it gets light, but they all lay in one nest box with another one spare. Once every few weeks their is an egg laid on the floor in the middle of...

I know that it has been asked before, but is it OK for chickens to eat their own kind? I have leftover cooked chicken nearly every week from our Sunday lunch, is it OK for them to eat it?

I was just wondering if the time of day the chickens lay has anything to do with the size of the eggs. Two of my pullets lay their eggs before I go to let them out in a morning, when it's still dark. These two eggs are a bit small. My other pullets lay their eggs later in the morning between...

3 of my 6 pullets are laying every day, and apparently in the same order. There are 2 nest boxes for them to use, but the same one will go in to lay and the other 2 will wait and just stare at her until she is done and the next will go into the same nest, followed by the last one after that. Why...

How long after the first egg can I expect to wait for another? I would like to know which of my hens laid the egg, and because the first egg was laid outside in the middle of the run, I would like to try to teach them where to lay their eggs.

Can I expect one tomorrow and most days now?

My hens were out today in the garden, one of them got hold of a 4 inch strip of silicone sealant. They had them a couple of days ago but I managed to catch them before they swallowed them. Today, not so lucky. Will she be OK? She seemed fine for the rest of the day but I'm worried it won't...