Flock dynamic

[australorpluvr]

I'm sure this has been discussed to death but none of the previous answers exactly answer my question.

I have a flock of 8 hens. They were separated, 4 in a group, from 1 day old to about 2 months for an agriscience project for my high school science class. After the project, Groups A and B were introduced and lived together (still do). Within the first couple of days, we saw some bully chickens come out. Some chasing happened and I had to put at least 2 of the chickens on "time out" on different occasions. It seemed that the bullying was nipped in the bud while they lived inside a makeshift interior "coop" but we recently moved the flock outside to a much larger coop with a run and the bullying seems to be getting worse.

I have one for sure bully hen named Lovebug. Not much of a chicken lover really, but she loves people. She runs up to the front whenever someone enters the coop, and doesn't mind being picked up or pet. The one thing I have noticed is, she doesn't particularly like to share. Whenever treats are offered to the flock, she is very quick to peck at the others to get them away from "her" treat. If I pick another hen up, upon setting them down they have a chance at being chased or pecked at by her. She is one of the smaller hens but has titled herself as a flock leader. There are a couple of other bully chickens, another hen of smaller stature named Jewels. She is NOT a fan of humans and because of that I rarely pick her up now due to usually being harmed in the process. The two of them seem to be fine with each other but Jewels doesn't put up with lovebugs' incessant bullying of the others. There have been occasions where Jewels get in-between Lovebug and her bully victim which seems to put an end to it in the moment. Two of the lowest ranking hens, Juno and Mama have had to isolate themselves and form almost a mini flock of just them two due to the bullying. The two usually reside down in the run under the coop in a far corner that I can't get to. Lovebug seems to make it her goal to torment these two any chance she gets. She will chase Mama for no apparent reason. She pecks at Juno constantly. So much so that Juno has now formed a small sore above her beak. Although both Juno and Mama are pretty shy, I'm not sure it's all due to their personalities. I think it's partly out of fear of being attacked by Lovebug if they get attention from me. When they were separated as chicks, Mama was the flock leader of her little 4 chick flock. Juno was in her group as chicks. Now she has completely given up that title and just sits all day in the corner with Juno. Occasionally she will come to the front to get food and water but other than that she stays in her corner.

I don't think its fair for the other chickens to live in constant fear of her or jewels. It seems to be that Lovebug is unnecessarily jealous all the time for attention. I don't want to cull the bullies of the flock if I don't have to. I've looked into the pinless peepers and isolation but if any other tactics could work, I'm all ears. Thanks in advance.

 

[rosemarythyme]

Photos and dimensions of your set up would help. Do you have ample clutter https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/a-cluttered-run.1323792/page-6#post-25037140 to break up the space and provide hiding spots, and multiple feeders spread out so birds can eat without being seeing from every corner of the run?

Also any bird that pecks others when they get picked up and put down, I simply don't put other birds down in their line of sight.

 

[australorpluvr]

Photos and dimensions of your set up would help. Do you have ample clutter https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/a-cluttered-run.1323792/page-6#post-25037140 to break up the space and provide hiding spots, and multiple feeders spread out so birds can eat without being seeing from every corner of the run?

Also any bird that pecks others when they get picked up and put down, I simply don't put other birds down in their line of sight.

Unfortunately our coop/run isn't huge. Its big enough to stand/walk into but not a whole massive area for them to run around (or hide) from each other. The link below is the exact coop we have. They have 1 feeder and 1 waterer near the entrance of the coop with 3 feeding points on both.

https://www.tractorsupply.com/tsc/p...dtU4ip0Jmn4iLmz8cj0zG6mEz-m4KJRhoCEc4QAvD_BwE

Their food/water is something kind of like this but not exactly;

I was thinking about putting another food and water in their coop but again, space is a concern. They had the dinky plastic feed and water containers from tractor supply for the majority of their lives and I think just about every 2 days they would knock both over and mess their bedding up+ get rid of their food and water source until I came in and checked on them. I was probably in their coop just re-filling water and food/ mucking out the nasty water soaked bedding 2-4 times a day back then .

With the space available, what could I do to create clutter?

 

[aart]

Unfortunately our coop/run isn't huge.

What does that mean in feet by feet?
Dimensions and pics are always very helpful in situations like this.

With the space available, what could I do to create clutter?

There's a link in @rosemarythyme 's post that will give you lots of examples.

 

[SamLockwood]

The problem with most of the commercially-available coops is they vastly over-estimate the number of birds that can fit in their coops. That page says it's big enough for 14 hens, but the usual recommendation is 4 square feet of coop floor area per chicken, and 10 square feet of run. That looks like it's got roughly 25 square feet of coop, and about 48 square feet of run (maybe another 25 counting the area under the coop). So space for 4 to 6 chickens.

Most "bullying" is really normal chicken behavior: Everything is pecking order and there's the most chaos when you either have a totally new flock that's shaking its social order out, or if something changes like integrating new birds or the flock loses members.

Even with an established pecking order there's challenges or somebody doesn't get out of the way fast enough. The normal pattern is they'll chase off the offender until they're out of sight or the immediate area. If the other bird can't or won't leave, it's interpreted as a challenge and the aggression will escalate.

If they're confined into too small a space, confrontations happen more often and the can't de-escalate because the other bird can't go on a "time out."

If you keep intervening in pecking order squabbles between the hens, you're taking on the rooster's role in the flock and your hens will constantly look to you to do that. This is fine if you want a full time job as "chicken referee".

Otherwise you're going to have to either expand your run area (it needs to be twice as large) or reduce your flock by two to four hens.

Also, I'd recommend reinforcing the bottom perimeter of that setup. As pictured it's very vulnerable to not only digging predators but anything strong enough to bend the wire in between those rather thin-looking legs and force its way under. I'd run boards horizontally along the bottom linking the legs together and attach the wire to those boards. Then either lift or jack the thing up and slip some 12"x12" pavers around the whole perimeter, or attach an apron of wire to the new boards and bury that apron a couple inches under the ground.

 

[rosemarythyme]

Unfortunately our coop/run isn't huge. Its big enough to stand/walk into but not a whole massive area for them to run around (or hide) from each other. The link below is the exact coop we have. They have 1 feeder and 1 waterer near the entrance of the coop with 3 feeding points on both.

https://www.tractorsupply.com/tsc/p...dtU4ip0Jmn4iLmz8cj0zG6mEz-m4KJRhoCEc4QAvD_BwE

Their food/water is something kind of like this but not exactly;
View attachment 3727012

I was thinking about putting another food and water in their coop but again, space is a concern. They had the dinky plastic feed and water containers from tractor supply for the majority of their lives and I think just about every 2 days they would knock both over and mess their bedding up+ get rid of their food and water source until I came in and checked on them. I was probably in their coop just re-filling water and food/ mucking out the nasty water soaked bedding 2-4 times a day back then .

With the space available, what could I do to create clutter?

Yeah space is the issue here, there simply isn't room for all the birds and certainly nowhere to go for a bird that's being picked on. Imagine if your home was just 1 empty room, where you could see everything from one corner to another - impossible to hide like that, and if you were eating in one corner obviously someone standing in another corner could clearly see you.

It's also preventing you from being able to add clutter beyond maybe a single patio chair or a sawhorse or a pallet, as you'd lose too much floor space, but a single item can only do so much.

Realistically... If you cannot expand the set up, I'd reduce the flock by 50%, that's how many birds your run allows for max. And if the coop measurements are correct in the listing (5.675 sq. ft) that's really only enough for 1 bird, maybe 2 if they are very tolerant of each other, if they have to spend any time in there at all due to weather or whatnot.

I am very simple with feeders. I have a dry feeder inside the coop, but up to 4 bowls spread out in the run (for 9 birds right now), they're just cat dishes, large ramekins, things like that. But my run is 10x larger than yours so obviously that allows me to spread out the bowls in a way that you can't.

 

[australorpluvr]

The problem with most of the commercially-available coops is they vastly over-estimate the number of birds that can fit in their coops. That page says it's big enough for 14 hens, but the usual recommendation is 4 square feet of coop floor area per chicken, and 10 square feet of run. That looks like it's got roughly 25 square feet of coop, and about 48 square feet of run (maybe another 25 counting the area under the coop). So space for 4 to 6 chickens.

Most "bullying" is really normal chicken behavior: Everything is pecking order and there's the most chaos when you either have a totally new flock that's shaking its social order out, or if something changes like integrating new birds or the flock loses members.

Even with an established pecking order there's challenges or somebody doesn't get out of the way fast enough. The normal pattern is they'll chase off the offender until they're out of sight or the immediate area. If the other bird can't or won't leave, it's interpreted as a challenge and the aggression will escalate.

If they're confined into too small a space, confrontations happen more often and the can't de-escalate because the other bird can't go on a "time out."

If you keep intervening in pecking order squabbles between the hens, you're taking on the rooster's role in the flock and your hens will constantly look to you to do that. This is fine if you want a full time job as "chicken referee".

Otherwise you're going to have to either expand your run area (it needs to be twice as large) or reduce your flock by two to four hens.

Also, I'd recommend reinforcing the bottom perimeter of that setup. As pictured it's very vulnerable to not only digging predators but anything strong enough to bend the wire in between those rather thin-looking legs and force its way under. I'd run boards horizontally along the bottom linking the legs together and attach the wire to those boards. Then either lift or jack the thing up and slip some 12"x12" pavers around the whole perimeter, or attach an apron of wire to the new boards and bury that apron a couple inches under the ground.

Yes, the bottom is reinforced, There is a concrete base with sand on top of it so basically no way for predators to get under there. I will look into expanding the coop though, thank you for the advice.

 

[NatJ]

That looks like it's got roughly 25 square feet of coop

Working from what the page says:

"5.675 sq. ft. coop accommodates up to 14 chickens"

That is much smaller than your estimate of 25 square feet of coop. Are you assuming they have a typo or something?

If the coop is actually 5 feet wide (based on 60" run width), I would guess it to have about 3 feet long (1/3 of the run length: run is a bit over 9 feet long), so that would make the coop about 15 square feet. So if I don't trust the on-page number, I would guess 15 square feet rather than 25 square feet of coop.

and about 48 square feet of run (maybe another 25 counting the area under the coop).

"Run dimensions: 113.96 in. L x 60 in. W"
If I multiply that out and convert to square feet, I agree it is about 48 square feet of run, which matches what you thought.

Looking at the "run dimensions" and the "overall dimensions," the area under the coop must already be included in the run dimensions. So just the 48 square feet, not more.

So space for 4 to 6 chickens.

I agree, except I think I would got for 4 not 6.

I don't think its fair for the other chickens to live in constant fear of her or jewels. It seems to be that Lovebug is unnecessarily jealous all the time for attention. I don't want to cull the bullies of the flock if I don't have to. I've looked into the pinless peepers and isolation but if any other tactics could work, I'm all ears. Thanks in advance.

I would either get a much larger coop/run setup,
or get a second coop/run like that and move half the chickens,
or get rid of the bullies,
or get rid of the victims.

"Get rid of" could mean rehoming, or butchering, or having them euthanized by a vet, or any other method that permanently removes them from the situation.

If you split the flock into two coops, pay attention to who gets along with who, and try to group them in a way that makes for peace.