The two most dominate girls (who are 5 weeks old today) are jumping at me like they do the other girls. I take them outside and they jump at each other and then try to jump and peck at me. What gives? I didn't think I was in the pecking order.
Teenagers....always seeing what they can get away with. I think this is just a phase, you are the top hen.
Originally Posted by rendezvous1838 There are different schools of thought on this. While some people feel you are a part of the pecking order and you must use violence to establish this...I have found this means constantly re-establishing your dominance in an endless cycle of aggression. Instead, I do not see myself as part of the pecking order. I'm there for food, water, and shelter...not to be a chicken. When my rooster hit adolescence he did some testing pecks. Luckily this was in winter and I withstood his pecks on my gloves and boots without any reaction whatsoever. It became as boring to him as pecking a wall. For about two weeks he'd do 30 sec to 1 min of testing pecks each morning, but then that phase ended and he's never done it again. And, even during this phase he never became truly aggressive since I never "upped" the game by hitting or kicking him. I consciously treat my chickens very differently than I would my dogs. While I teach a new puppy not to nip immediately when it begins to happen, I understand that chickens are poultry, not mammals, and operate on a different system.
