Challenges already - week 2 - older hen attacking her sister (new behavior)

[tanyafan24]

We started with two mature hens which we got with the coop from a friend. We had the hens for 1 week (they used to be free range hens but there are too many predators where we live to keep that going). One hen laid immediately and the second started laying on the 3rd day. The first week was great, no issues at all.

This past Saturday we picked up nine 17 week old RIR/White Rock mixes (Golden Comets?). We have them in the same area but the coops are separate and the runs are separated by hardware cloth. So they can see each other but cannot get to each other. The coops are each 4x4. We are in the process of building two additions to the coop (an additional coop area w/roosting bars and a row of nesting boxes). They also have a the run area that is 16x8 (we will expand this at some point this spring/summer).

One of the older hens is now attacking her "sister" in the rear end. She has drawn blood. We have them separated today. We planned on introducing all 11 of them them one night this week in the larger run area. From what we have observed there is a least 1 girl in the new batch who seems to be pretty dominant (the nine new girls seem to all be getting along just fine) so I wonder if she will take care of the bully or if the bully is just warming up on her sister.

I don't want to have to get rid of the "bully" but I don't want to deal with this in the larger flock either.

With all of this being said, we have been a "chicken family" for only 8 days now and I am feeling like maybe we are in over our heads already!!

HELP?!?!?!?

 

[SurferchickinSB]

I think there is just too much commotion going on in too short of a period of time and it may be the stress of it is causing the one chicken to attack the other one that she is with, maybe because in reality she wants to get to the other ones that she can see.

 

[SurferchickinSB]

Could you put up some sort of barrier temporarily, so she can’t visibly see the other chickens for a couple weeks? Maybe try that and see if her behavior changes.

 

[tanyafan24]

We can try that...we can put up a solid barrier over the hardware cloth between the runs under the coop and only continue to let them out into the larger run area separately. Any idea how long it will take the healing chicken to grow back her feathers and rejoin the group?
We had thought it was probably stress... poor girls...

 

[SurferchickinSB]

We can try that...we can put up a solid barrier over the hardware cloth between the runs under the coop and only continue to let them out into the larger run area separately. Any idea how long it will take the healing chicken to grow back her feathers and rejoin the group?
We had thought it was probably stress... poor girls...

It takes a while because the sores have to heal and then the feathers will grow back. Why did you separate them I thought there was only two that were together and the problem only started after you put a bunch of new ones in? My chickens don’t like any sort of change and so I just try to introduce one change at a time until they are used to it. Is the other one being that much of a bully? I thought they were raised together? Just make sure it doesn’t get infected. I don’t know how bad it is because I don’t think you posted a picture.

 

[tanyafan24]

Yes, they were raised together...but with further reading we figured we needed to separate them...she wouldn’t leave her sister alone and she was pecking her and making her bleed...the blood was just too much to keep them together...we gave the hurt one a bath tonight in epsom salt, cleaned her all up, blow dried her and put on some bluecote...she was very sweet and seemed to enjoy her spa time... we’ve put her back in her coop and put the bully in a separate area totally out of sight ...(in a crate in the barn). We are going to keep them separate for a week, give the Bullied girl a break and see where we go from there... I kind of understand the whole pecking order thing but this was getting a little extreme and we need to get all of the chickens in the same area I order to make the coop big enough for everyone ... not sure this makes sense but if we need to bathe our girl again I will take pictures so I can give a better idea of the age done...

 

[SurferchickinSB]

Yes, they were raised together...but with further reading we figured we needed to separate them...she wouldn’t leave her sister alone and she was pecking her and making her bleed...the blood was just too much to keep them together...we gave the hurt one a bath tonight in epsom salt, cleaned her all up, blow dried her and put on some bluecote...she was very sweet and seemed to enjoy her spa time... we’ve put her back in her coop and put the bully in a separate area totally out of sight ...(in a crate in the barn). We are going to keep them separate for a week, give the Bullied girl a break and see where we go from there... I kind of understand the whole pecking order thing but this was getting a little extreme and we need to get all of the chickens in the same area I order to make the coop big enough for everyone ... not sure this makes sense but if we need to bathe our girl again I will take pictures so I can give a better idea of the age done...

Well, chickens do need a lot of room, otherwise they will pick on each other a lot and then there will be nowhere for the bullied one to go.

 

[chickens really]

Look no touch still triggers dominate behaviour so the new Birds are definitely causing issues...

 

[aart]

I think there is just too much commotion going on in too short of a period of time and it may be the stress of it is causing the one chicken to attack the other one that she is with, maybe because in reality she wants to get to the other ones that she can see.

This^^^

 

[tanyafan24]

Just wanted to update this ... We had tried to reintroduce the "bully" chicken after a bit of research and reading on this. It did not go well either time and the flock was really doing well with the "bullied" lady and the new girls all getting along so good! The "bully" has joined our neighbors flock...she found the flock when we had let her free range and she flew over their fence and has been there ever since...who knew!! The girl who was bullied is healing nicely and getting along fine with her 9 new sisters. Thanks for responding last week! I appreciate it