Chickens won’t leave coop

[colorfuljill]

How can I get my chickens to leave the coop? We had them closed in the coop for 4 days while we finished enclosing their run. Now they won’t leave, they have been in there for two days. They will walk up to the coop door and peek their heads out, farthest I’ve seen them go is half way down their ramp that leads up to the coop. I leave the coop door open at night because they have no predators (I live in Hawaii, and their run is completely enclosed). I removed their food and water out of the coop and placed it in a designated area in the run. Because I’m afraid of them getting dehydrated I will place some water in the coop later in the day, I have not placed food back into the coop. I’ve even tried enticing them out with scratch and a little bit of scrabbled eggs but no luck. Any suggestions? Or will they come out when they are ready

 

[CluckerFamily]

Just give them time.
It’s a new place plus all the noise from building the run spooked them. They will come out when they are ready.

 

[colorfuljill]

Should I leave their food and water out of the coop?

 

[3KillerBs]

Welcome to BYC.

You can either take the approach of letting them slowly make up their mind about when to come out or you can push them out through the pop door in hope that they'll discover "Hey, the food's here!" and be OK.

Both ways can work.

Does your run have clutter and cover or is it wide open and exposed? Chickens like shelter better than open space.

 

[Mellowmalt]

you could always grab em, throw them into the run, peck at the food with a finger but don't scare them doing any of this.
I'm really surprised scrambled eggs didn't entice them so they are still in shock and scared of you.
Even though the approach above will work I would rather gain the chickens trust over getting them to use the run, if they don't ever want to use the run I'd be quite happy here tbh lol. I'd get more chickens and save on the run space

The clutter advice is really good advice. Tree branches, benches, old pallets and tyres are great.


But the main issue is that they are terrified from having been moved wherever they came from. Maybe they have never experienced the outside before this.

So they got traumatised, locked in a coop for 4 days in a strange new place and the big scary person took their food and water away.

They are simple animals but they remember things so who knows, maybe they were not treated too well. You need to gain their trust and once they do then there should be nothing stopping them running up to you and following you around whereever you go.

You cannot force trust however so to me you are taking the wrong approach. Forget if they are using the run or not. In time they will. What is more important that they want to start using the run and are not scared or that they use the run because they'd starve otherwise but are too scared to do so?

 

[CluckerFamily]

Should I leave their food and water out of the coop?

I personally would keep it in the coop and also in the run.

 

[3KillerBs]

Another thing you could do is put a trail of treats down the ramp.

 

[colorfuljill]

Welcome to BYC.

You can either take the approach of letting them slowly make up their mind about when to come out or you can push them out through the pop door in hope that they'll discover "Hey, the food's here!" and be OK.

Both ways can work.

Does your run have clutter and cover or is it wide open and exposed? Chickens like shelter better than open space.

Thanks for the advice. I don’t have clutter in my run, but I have materials to proved them a few hiding spaces