Blood In coop

[tennis97]

A few days ago I noticed one hen had blood in her feathers on the back of the neck. I noticed black scabs on the red part of her head. Then I noticed that blood was sprayed on the inside of the coop. Could this be from being in too small of a space over night? Are the others attacking her?

 

[btguy]

if others are attacking her she will be missing feathers on the back of her head and neck, they tend to constantly harrass rather than attempt to kill so a single piece of damage wont be them though they will peck at the blood until it looks like it was so segregate her till it heals, if not its likely from an exposed nail/splinter or from a predator reaching through the wire. at least in my experience. just check for opening/nails and when you put her back watch them for a while. 2 marans roos just became dinner for doing that to a silkie over here but they took the skin and feathers off the back of her head and neck so it was really obvious.

 

[tennis97]

I didn't notice any missing feathers, just the blood spray on her feathers as well as all around the coop. Thanks so much for your help!

 

[cafarmgirl]

If there are too many birds in too small a space they may well be fighting over roost space when they go in at night. They usually aim for the head when they peck and it doesn't take much to draw some blood.

How big is your coop, how much roost space and how many birds do you have? This also can happen even with plenty of space if you have an aggressive or bully bird.

 

[Chook-Girl]

A full grown chicken needs 4 square feet in a coop, and a bantam needs 2-3 feet.

 

[StephanieC]

Been there, done this...pretty recently, except mine was worse. I had pools of blood. I was told my coop was pretty tight, and my roosting bar definitely too short. Sounds to me as if you have a similar situation.

I isolated my attacked bird (who was bloodied up on the head but not missing feathers) until she was healed, then reintroduced her to the flock after modifying my coop according to suggestions from very helpful people on here.

Do what I was asked to do and take a photo of your coop, and give dimensions, including the length of the roost bar. And, of course, how many of what size chickens you have.

Prior to my problem, I had heard about "so many square feet per bird" in the coop, but had somehow missed the other minimum of 1 foot of roost bar per bird.