help! chicks roosting in trees!

[ausamerican33]

My 11 week old girls have been free-ranging during the day, all day, for the past 3 weeks. At night, around 6:30pm, I usually go close them up in their coop/run. Yesterday, I cleaned their coop (scrubbed poop off their roosts), and moved their coop about 20 feet to a fresh patch of pasture - we've done this about 3 times before. Last night - we went up to "put the chickens up" - and about 6 were roosting in a nearby tree, and several others under a nearby bush, and one on top of the coop. Ack!! Do you think this is b/c I scrubbed the roosts, and they still smelled bleachy? I hadn't turned the light on in the coop yet, so maybe it was too dark? I really don't want this to become a daily event - it was not easy getting them down. Does anyone have any ideas or suggestions? Usually they just come in the coop with a little encouragemnt and a handful of scratch and bread.

 

[tvtaber]

When my hens were young and I changed the shavings they would act like I did something horrible. If I'd scrubbed it they probably would have slept outside as well! Being too dark should not be an issue since they go to bed so early when it is still really light. Maybe it was just a lovely evening and they were enjoying it!

 

[ChickenSmitten]

My 7 week olds roosted outside too,
It took three nights of chicken rounding up and herding, but then it was them back to tucking themselves in properly again, they haven't roosted outdoors in the 5 weeks since that episode

 

[ausamerican33]

That means there is hope in sight! I thought they might be rebelling against the coop cleaning - they acted like they didn't even recognize their coop - silly birds. And it did get a very thorough scrubbing. We will see what tonight brings - thanks for the responses. If anyone else has any stories to tell/advice to share, I'd love to hear them!

 

[pixiechic]

I have a few that like to roost in trees . I thought it was kinda funny at first, but it's not a safe place for them to sleep. If they keep doing it, you can try clipping one wing, but that didn't make much of a difference for us. What worked was a combination of two things:

1) knocking/shaking them out of the trees consistently; and
2) cutting off the lower tree branches so they couldn't get up there.

 

[ausamerican33]

Thank you for your suggestions!