canabalism

[aart]

I am feeding layer mash and scratch. Coop is an old pup trailer so 8 ft wide and I guess 10 foot tall and 20 foot long We did not have snow til Christmas day, so they were in the run every day. They are pecking at rear ends til bloody mess and, if I don't catch it early enough, dead. As I said I had to remove 13 of them and had 2 dead in the last 4 days. This has been an ongoing problem but is dramatically worse in the last week.

Not just crowded but sardine can cramped....and probably seriously nutrient deficient, depending on the protein percentages of mash and scratch and ratio of mix.

 

[lazy gardener]

What Aart says. You need to cut flock size in half, and get them on an immediate high protein diet. You should also eliminate ALL scratch from their diet. Hoping it's not too late to turn this issue around. If 2 - 3 weeks of high protein diet (I'd get them on 20%, and be sure it's of a recent mill date, less than 6 weeks old) does not stop the problem, you may need to cull the entire flock.

 

[bluebird]

Good luck in solving this issue Dee

 

[keesmom]

You have far too many birds for the space you have, especially for this time of year in a cold climate. On top of that there's the low protein diet.

I have one coop that's 8x16. I've never overwintered more than 15 in it knowing there are days (or months) they are stuck inside.