One of my RIRs made a nest on top of a dog cage that overlooks the whole coop, complete with sheets (for bedding) and a view.Another RIR moved into the nest and they fight over it every morning, the one that was there first will get her face pecked at until she moves, sometimes she can be stubborn and will get pecked at for a while . There are plenty of empty nesting spots, 5 spots to choose from at that time in the morning, why do they have to fight over THIS spot? If I take the bedding away she'll still lay there, she was laying on a cardboard surface up there before I gave her something to lay on. I'm sure fighting over other nests goes on all day, but why would this nest be so special?
LOL...glad my hens arent the only weird ones. I put some hay down for them to use as nest matterial....I got one hen still laying next to the doghouse in a dirt nest
I made a special on the floor nestbox for my special needs hen. She doesn't use it. The other hens fight over it.
Hens don't have much of a brain unfortunately (or maybe it is fortunate) but popular theories say that if a hen is sitting in a spot, the other ones figure that if she knows it's a good spot then they might as well lay their eggs there as well.
Yup, mine do it too. They don't fight all the time, but I witnessed this one day. https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=243625
