One of my Buff Orpingtons is acting very weird. I suspect that she's broody because she stays in her nest All. The. Time. She's picked out her belly feathers and has stopped laying. However, we gather eggs multiple times a day, so nothing has been left in there for her to think she can hatch. She doesn't growl at me when I pick her up to throw her out of the nest and is quite docile, in fact.
What makes me worry that it's something other than broodiness is that when I do toss her out of the coop she runs around like she's drunk. She lets her wings hang loose at her sides. She takes off running in a sudden burst and squawks loudly. The other hens bully her now.
She's been like this for over a week now. Probably longer, but I only realized it about a week ago. All 11 of my hens look identical, so I finally marked her to determine if it was the same hen in the same two nests day after day. She's less than a year old, so it's not an old age thing.
Any ideas? Thanks!
What makes me worry that it's something other than broodiness is that when I do toss her out of the coop she runs around like she's drunk. She lets her wings hang loose at her sides. She takes off running in a sudden burst and squawks loudly. The other hens bully her now.
She's been like this for over a week now. Probably longer, but I only realized it about a week ago. All 11 of my hens look identical, so I finally marked her to determine if it was the same hen in the same two nests day after day. She's less than a year old, so it's not an old age thing.
Any ideas? Thanks!
