Chickens Refuse to use Roost?

[dalasgalas]

This entire thread made my day. Chickens are hilarious.

 

[cathloveydovey]

From my experience chickens tend not to use ramps as much as we would hope they would, especially going upward.

The only things I can suggest is
1. roost height is possibly too high.
2. what is the roost itself? The width of the bar is important: too thin and it's too much work to hold on... too thick and they again strain to hold on.
3. A bully that doesn't let them up there.

My suggestion is to stay out there at dusk when they go in and watch them to see what they are doing to see if you can spot the issue. Sorry if these suggestions have already been posted or you have addressed them.

Roosts arent too high, our past Orpingtons never had a problem getting up to the roosts. The roost width is fine, our three veteran hens two of which are Orpington mixes have no problem.
The bully is the most probable one. There really isnt anything I can do to get rid of her as of now. Unless my dad lets me beat her to death
Its warmer today so I'll do that. And its perfectly fine!

 

[cathloveydovey]

This entire thread made my day. Chickens are hilarious.

Lol, you're welcome

 

[Clubber1234]

Roosts arent too high, our past Orpingtons never had a problem getting up to the roosts. The roost width is fine, our three veteran hens two of which are Orpington mixes have no problem.
The bully is the most probable one. There really isnt anything I can do to get rid of her as of now. Unless my dad lets me beat her to death
Its warmer today so I'll do that. And its perfectly fine!

Don't

 

[Carriebean]

Not sure how old your chickens are but my young ones always slept in the nest until I trained them to get on the roost. That consists of going out every night taking them out of the nest and putting them on the roost. Another thing I do is open the doors to the nest and they don't want to sleep exposed so they will jump up. Once they're up there I close them. It usually only takes a few nights for them to get the hang of it

 

[cathloveydovey]

Don't

*pats*
Twas a joke little one.
partially

 

[Clubber1234]

*pats*
Twas a joke little one.
partially

Okay good!

 

[cathloveydovey]

Not sure how old your chickens are but my young ones always slept in the nest until I trained them to get on the roost. That consists of going out every night taking them out of the nest and putting them on the roost. Another thing I do is open the doors to the nest and they don't want to sleep exposed so they will jump up. Once they're up there I close them. It usually only takes a few nights for them to get the hang of it

I might use something to block off where they sleep underneath the roost. Going to be hard though, the coop has so many nooks and crannies in it where they can slip through

 

[Kris5902]

Last night when I got home, one of my Sapphire boys hadn’t made the roost for some reason. Of course it was 5 hours after they usually go up for the night and full dark when I got in. I must’ve lost a little weight recently because I managed to get myself sideways through their pop door to my waist and twist around in it to grab him from the back corner and set him on the lowest roost convincing him my arm wasn’t a good spot was fun.

I’m just glad it was dark out because I can imagine how I must have looked bent over with my torso stuck in the door of my chicken tractor trying to get this little guy onto a roost! I do have a removable panel to access the area, but was just too tired to go get a drill to deal with it by then.

 

[cathloveydovey]

Last night when I got home, one of my Sapphire boys hadn’t made the roost for some reason. Of course it was 5 hours after they usually go up for the night and full dark when I got in. I must’ve lost a little weight recently because I managed to get myself sideways through their pop door to my waist and twist around in it to grab him from the back corner and set him on the lowest roost convincing him my arm wasn’t a good spot was fun.

I’m just glad it was dark out because I can imagine how I must have looked bent over with my torso stuck in the door of my chicken tractor trying to get this little guy onto a roost! I do have a removable panel to access the area, but was just too tired to go get a drill to deal with it by then.

Sounds f u n