Flock got along fine til now

[seminolewind]

I have a flock of 12 Polish. All doing fine together for about a year now in a very large pen. Now I have one who is being picked on by another hen, and to top it off, yesterday, several more as a group all pecking her including the rooster.. I guess the bullying has been going on for several weeks because the one hen stays in the coop all day every day. I had to move her in with the silkies.

What do I do? Will things ever get back to normal?

 

[seminolewind]

What do I do?

 

[SobbaChickens]

Is she acting sick or could she be injured? I've been reading so much lately that it's all getting jumbled but I KNOW I've read about how chickens can sense if something isn't right and will try and get rid of it.

How are the silkies handling her?

 

[SobbaChickens]

And maybe try that pine tar stuff. I've been reading that it's some pretty nasty stuff and helps to stop pecking

 

[dawg53]

I have a flock of 12 Polish. All doing fine together for about a year now in a very large pen. Now I have one who is being picked on by another hen, and to top it off, yesterday, several more as a group all pecking her including the rooster.. I guess the bullying has been going on for several weeks because the one hen stays in the coop all day every day. I had to move her in with the silkies.

What do I do? Will things ever get back to normal?

Sounds like a pecking order issue Karen. Maybe you can slip her back inside the coop with the Polish in the middle of the night. If she has minor pecking injuries, feathers missing etc...Vick's Vapor Rub put on her should take care of picking.

 

[Michael Apple]

Sounds like a pecking order issue Karen. Maybe you can slip her back inside the coop with the Polish in the middle of the night. If she has minor pecking injuries, feathers missing etc...Vick's Vapor Rub put on her should take care of picking.

X2. Pick-No-More works well too. Don't use pine tar since it is thick, messy and dirt adheres to it. Karen, you may not be able to reintroduce the Polish. If she does well with the Silkies, that's good. I never mix crested breeds with non crested breeds. The crested ones can't see as well and their head plumage is a picker's attractant.

 

[seminolewind]

Thank heavens , she's not sick. She's been eating like a pig since she's moved.

Yea, Dawg, it must be a pecking order thing. She actually started to lose weight even tho she stayed on top of the feeder and only ate if certain hens were there eating.

Vicks, Pine Tar, I was also thinking of spraying her a color. Would that help?