HELP! My hens are murders!!!

[Impatient]

Backstory:
Last September I hatched out some mutt chicks and ended up with 3 surviving hens after a hawk attack and bad winter killed off 4/7 (some idiots roosted outside and froze to death). So I call them my big ladies and they've been doing well and were laying well, healthy birds.

Fast forward: this past March I decide to order some purebred chicks from Green Fire Farms, which was NOT cheap ($350), I kept them inside until they were feathered out and large enough to go out to the main coop. Slow intro to the big ladies and it seemed like things were going alright other than the general pecking order being established. Then my area had a terrible heat wave and I lost two of the "babies" (bout 5mo old), now down to 4 babies, everyone still getting along other than an occasional squabble, I have a 5 gallon water jug and 10 gallon gravity feeder, so they always have water and food, along with treats (scratch and mealworms) and veggie food scraps. Now in the last TWO DAYS my big ladies have KILLED ALL 4 of the remaining babies and CANNIBALIZED the corpses. And I honestly have no idea why. There was no food or water shortage, no aggression issues, no space issues, I'm at a loss here for WHY they did this?

 

[Cyprus]

How can you be sure that it was your hens that killed these chicks and not a predator?
What are they housed in and when/where did they die?

 

[Wyorp Rock]

Photos of your coop/runs would be helpful.
How much space (sq ft) do they have in each?

What breed and sex were the 5 month olds?

It would be hard to know what happened unless you have a recording of what took place. Is it possible that a predator attacked and killed the youngsters and you found the adults picking at the corpses?

 

[Justso]

Sometimes it happens and it's just awful.
Very sorry for your lost, I hope you can find a solution here.

 

[rosemarythyme]

My guess is also that a predator injured or killed the chicks and the hens were just eating them, since they have no qualms about that sort of thing.

 

[Impatient]

This is a fully enclosed coop/run situation. I did consider a predator, but that would be limited to cats or raccoons and both of those could easily take on or at least injure the big girls and they haven't been touched at all. All the bodies were found in the coop, I found no holes or break in points that leads me to believe anything got in. A predator also tends to try and take their meal with them, these bodies were just left there...

 

[Wyorp Rock]

Photos of your coop/runs would be helpful.
How much space (sq ft) do they have in each?

What breed and sex were the 5 month olds?

 

[HenniesInMyHeart]

Stress and close confinement can also cause cannibalism. The recent weather extremes could have triggered them. Do they have a big enough area? Do you have breeds that do okay in confinement? Do you ever let your birds out? Just some things to think about.
ETA: Cats and coons would probably pick off the smaller birds because they're easier to defeat then a full grown hen.

 

[snow5164]

Breed is a huge factor , I had Icelandic land race birds , we did not get along . They ate eggs, pecked at each other and annoyed the living heck out of me .

If you answer some of the questions being asked then people can try to help you , sorry you had to go threw this. That’s a lot of money for birds

 

[chickengeorgeto]

... this past March I decide to order some purebred chicks from Green Fire Farms, which was NOT cheap ($350), I kept them inside until they were feathered out and large enough to go out to the main coop.... Now in the last TWO DAYS my big ladies have KILLED ALL 4 of the remaining babies and CANNIBALIZED the corpses....

From your post I get the impression that you are feeding a diet high in vegetable matter. Chickens dearly hate a vegetarian diet, hens for the lack of a better description are Steak & Steak feeders, regardless of what groups like PETA may say.