Help! Chicken is acting crazy!!!

[bmill88]

Hello fellow chicken lovers,
My chicken is acting very strange today. She is being much louder than normal and bawking almost all day. She also keeps crawling in and out from under the fire pit we have in our yard. She is 20 weeks and has developed her comb and waddles. She is also head chicken as well. I don't know what's wrong with her is she egg bound? Or is she about to lay her first egg?

 

[I Love Layers]

Hello fellow chicken lovers,
My chicken is acting very strange today. She is being much louder than normal and bawking almost all day. She also keeps crawling in and out from under the fire pit we have in our yard. She is 20 weeks and has developed her comb and waddles. She is also head chicken as well. I don't know what's wrong with her is she egg bound? Or is she about to lay her first egg?

Most likely laid an egg!

Or she is looking for spots to lay one

 

[bmill88]

Most likely laid an egg!

I have not found any eggs yet, I keep checking but I don't see any. I finally got her away from the fire pit and put some soft grass in her coop. She liked that for a bit then left to wander around the yard. How do you tell if she is egg bound?

 

[I Love Layers]

https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/how-to-diagnose-and-treat-a-egg-bound-hen
This is a good article on egg bound hens.

 

[I Love Layers]

She may also be broody. Unlikely though since she hasn't laid yet

 

[carlf]

I am betting on getting ready to lay.
Make sure there are fake eggs or golf balls in the nest box and that she can see them.
Pen her up in the run until she lays in the nest box. If no, she will pick the spot and you may not find them until she has laid a pile of egg. Did you check under the fire pit for eggs???

Doubt she's broody if she has hasn't laid yet. But stranger things happen.

 

[GC-Raptor]

She's looking for a place to lay. 2 of my girls were doing the same, moving the straw to the corner of the coop and talking loud, acting strangely.
So I put the nest boxes in the coop, filled with straw and ceramic eggs. The next day I heard the chicken song. So I went to investigate, looking for an egg. Didn't find any. she was running around the coop. So I picked her up and put her in the nest. 30 minutes later later she laid her first egg.
Her sister laid the next day on the floor of the coop. GC

 

[bmill88]

I am betting on getting ready to lay.
Make sure there are fake eggs or golf balls in the nest box and that she can see them. 
Pen her up in the run until she lays in the nest box. If no, she will pick the spot and you may not find them until she has laid a pile of egg. Did you check under the fire pit for eggs???

Doubt she's broody if she has hasn't laid yet. But stranger things happen.

I have checked all over the yard for eggs but I have not found any. She keeps wandering the yard and squawking loudly. She usually squawks loudly anyway, but today has been noticeably louder and more often. She keeps wandering off by herself. She will go in her run and coop but it's a hot day today so she keeps moving around to cooler areas

 

[carlf]

You might find eggs all over the place the first few weeks. Like they had an "accident" trying to get to the nest box!

Its all normal.

 

[bmill88]

THERE IT IS!!!! She just sang her song and I ran to under the fire pit and saw it! So proud of her!!!