hen in nestbox

[armdchicken]

So i have a buff leghorn who instead of roosting on the roost with the other chickens she sleeps in the nestbox unless i put her on the roost. any ideas why she would sleep in the nestbox? any help would be appreciated

 

[armdchicken]

anyone?

 

[DAFox]

Is she at the bottom of the pecking order? Is she broody possibly? Does she have any foot or leg issues that would make it painful to roost?
Dale-Ann

 

[bobbieschicks]

Ditto the other questions asked. Also, is she laying already or at POL? Could she be practicing laying and you just caught her? My EE just started laying over New Years and she would get in the nest box and hang out for hours the couple of days before actually laying the egg. Then once she laid an egg she would hang out for hours in the box after I had snatched away the egg. However, she still got out and went up on the roost at night.

 

[theoldchick]

If she wants to go broody, she'll hang out in the next box after dark. When they go in serious broody mode they look at you like this:

Meanwhile this gal wants me to get the camera out of her face so she can get back to work:

 

[coolcanoechic]

Quote:

 

[rigagirl]

i have a couple girls that do it once in a while, never thought it was a big deal

 

[buckabucka]

Are your nest boxes higher up than your roost? That would make them want to sleep in there. Mine only sleep in the nest box when they are broody.

 

[azygous]

I have an EE, Flo, who simply can't cope with the nightly, roosting pecking and irritability of her perch mates. She just says, the heck with it, and gets into a nest box. I refuse to let any hen sleep in a nest box, so Flo gets evicted.

It helps to figure out which hens will leave the alienated one alone, and perch her next to this one. I also try to situate Flo at the end so she has less exposure to confrontation.

Also, a little detail such as positioning your combative ones on the perch head to tail, opposed to head to head, will alleviate a lot of the bickering.

I know this is way more refereeing and micro-managing than most people are willing to devote to roosting chickens, but some of us are willing to put forth the effort, nonetheless.

 

[armdchicken]

Quote:
No shes not broody, last year my wyandotte, Bullhead, went broody. She was on the bottom of the pecking order when we had 3 chickens, her another hen and my rooster, mainly because our rooster picked a favorite hen. Our next boxes are kinda hard to get to, just because you have to go down under hay.