Chickens not spreading out

[jehaz]

Hi,

I have a very large coop for my 25 birds.
The have 2 floors and a LOT of space, but they all just want to squish each other in a corner of the coop, next to the door.

My Silver Speckled Hamburg (Hamburger) just sits at the door on the top of the ladder, half in, half out.
But all my other birds (wyandottes, orpingtons, dominique, polish, etc) just practically climb on top of each other. You'd never know there were 24 birds in that heap, it just looks like 3 they compress so tightly.

And it's not as if they're cold! It's Tennessee in the summertime, and most of my birds are cold-hardy!!

How can I get them to be reasonable and use their space better?
How can I get them to go upstairs (theres actually more space upstairs)!?!?!.

The just dont seem to be thinking this one through very logically.


James

 

[Veer67]

Do you have a roost for them?

 

[jehaz]

Yes, there is a line of nesting boxes on the lower floor. 12"x12"x each.
They are about 16 weeks old and not laying yet.

 

[Veer67]

The kind of roost I'm talking about looks like this.

 

[jehaz]

oh some climbing apparatus.
No but I'm working on that. I have a felled tree, so I'm going to put the stump in the pen and some 4x4s in the coop in the design you have.
I might put the 4x4s on the top floor - will that make them want to go upstairs if there is a jungle jim up there?,

 

[cafarmgirl]

Are you talking about daytime or wanting them to go in and roost at night? Can you post a picture of your setup and include the size?

 

[Veer67]

I think that they should, chickens have a natural instinct to roost at night in a high place, when people don't provide coops for their chickens they will fly up in the trees to sleep at night..