5 1/2 week old chicks sleeping in nesting box

[briter30]

I just posted a similar question last week and got some responses that has really helped out, unfortunately it involved some work on my part. First, make sure your nesting box is lower than your perches. Second, I temporarily closed off the nesting boxes with some plywood until my 12 week old chickens were closer to nesting. After a week of doing that, they seem to be accepting the new perches nicely. Do make sure there is enough room on the perches to accommodate the chickens.
Terri

 

[urbanchickmama]

i was wondering a similar thing. our chicks are about 8 weeks and all but 2 of our 13 pile into one of our 6 recently completed nesting boxes. our nesting boxes are fairly high off the ground and the roosting perch is much lower. should i start preventing them from sleeping there? do we need to rebuild that wall of our coop to make the nesting boxes lower??? here's a picture i took tonight:

 

[cobra2411]

Well I added my permanent "ladder" roost and they've stopped going into the nesting box. I've got 3 levels of roosting, the first is lower then the boxes but the middle and upper ones are higher. There's enough room that they should be able to get 3-4 across when they're fully grown so there should aways be enough room higher then the nesting boxes. As of yet they haven't gone for the highest roost but I think it's a confidence thing. Right now they just jump off to the ground and it's a little far for them (~30" off the ground). Since they're so small they can all fit side by side and last night when I went to check on them they all were on the middle roost. It was soooo cute.