We have 12 chickens - 1/2 barred rocks, the rest are new Hampshire and rhode island reds. We have an English bantam rooster but he's harmless. My husband and I have found 2 chickens (barred rock) dead in two days in a row. THey were in the same nesting box (not one they use for eggs) and have been torn apart by the other chickens. This is a new pack of chickens but went 4 or 5 days without any incident when we put them together in a big horse stall (which we have converted to a coop). THey have plenty of food and water. What could be going on here? I should say there is no evidence of critters and we have it pretty tightly sealed up. Any and all advice is welcome!
Welcome to BYC - sorry you are having such a rough go of things right now. You mention this is a "new pack" of chickens - how long have you had the birds, were they sourced from multiple places, did you exercise any sort of quarantine procedures between the groups if they were from more than one source, how old are the birds, what are you feeding, etc?
Thanks for the quick reply! Great questions. They were sourced from the same place. However, they were separated by breed because the farm had just inherited 500 chickens as a result of an estate sale. They are 9 months old but are beautiful birds - some of the most beautiful, colorful birds I have seen. We are feeding them the same feed that they were given at the farm which is a high quality non-GMO feed (a bit pricey...). Should we separate the breeds? I have been watching them and thought the barred rocks were being dominant so that is why it is weird that they are the ones ending up dead. If you think we should separate - for how long?
When you say torn up, please describe the damage. Where exactly were they wounded? Were they still in the nest box? Please describe your coop, especially your doors, ventilation, chicken wire or hardware cloth over windows and/or vents.
