HELP! Why do they Buh-gawk like this?

[CarriBrown]

Quote:
Probably not. For whatever reason, they all seem to favor one box... doesn't matter if you have 100!

 

[speckledhen]

I have plenty of nestboxes and I get the "Chicken Asylum Chorus" every morning about 6 a.m. Actually, it cracks me up first thing to hear them tuning up. I think they see things out the window, like neighborhood cats or foxes or whatever, roaming past.

 

[Churkenduse]

Mine was doing that this morning, woke me up, they are close to the house.

I thought it was she is ready to lay but not, no one else did either.

I stopped her by giving her some sprouts to distract her.
I have neighbors too.

I asked one neighbor if they bother him and he said that they are too busy in the moring getting ready for work and school they don't notice. I hope that helps.

 

[LilPeeps]

Mine do that whenever they get freaked out, but it's never just one of them. When one starts, they ALL do. I have close neighbors, so I usually have to give them treats to get them to stop lol

 

[Miss Sue]

My hen does this almost every dusk. I have no idea why! I figure it's her last statement of the evening before she goes to bed. It's kind of a hoot. I wish I knew what she meant. Whatever it is, it's definitely opinionated.

Susan

 

[kayri]

Mine do it when they look for each other. Usually one has spent some time in the nesting box laying an egg and therfore becomes separated from the other four. The separated one runs up onto our deck (the high point of the yard) and buh-gawks until the others show themselves and then she runs off and joins them.

 

[Charlie Chicken]

What you have here is the classic chicken buh-gawking that signals that they are alarmed about something. It could be for any reason often known only to the chicken. Sometimes they have a legitimate reason like just having laid an egg or spotting a predator nearby and sometimes it could simply be from the chicken spotting a leaf fall from a tree.

What makes it fun is when you have a flock of 25 or so and when one chicken starts squawking for no apparent reason and the other 24 feel the need to join in!

 

[SeaChick]

FWIW, our girls definitely ba-gawked more when they first started laying eggs in the fall. I would hear the "egg declaration" 4 or 5 times a day. They seem to have calmed down no, although I still hear it occasionally. So maybe it won't last....

 

[chickbea]

Mine will do that from time to time when they have laid an egg and they are especially proud of it.

I sing along with them, as it sounds like they are saying: "I-layed-an EGG!", "I-layed-an EGG!"
If it is at all helpful, mine seem to do this in spurts - they will do it for a week or so, then forget about it for a while, then start again out of the blue for a couple days. Hopefully yours will stop soon.
I would try another nest box or two anyway.

 

[JenniferJoIN]

Mine have been uncharacteristically loud lately also... but they're not laying yet. I mean they get REALLY loud. It's a good thing we live in the country or I'd be worried about the noise too!