Hens roosting on top of the coop

[Petra]

I have a covered area inside a chain link dog run with a store bought wood coop inside. My hens want to roost on top of the coop. Winters in Prescott Valley can be cold and windy. Should I force them inside or let them do what they please? thanks

 

[DobieLover]

I have a covered area inside a chain link dog run with a store bought wood coop inside. My hens want to roost on top of the coop. Winters in Prescott Valley can be cold and windy. Should I force them inside or let them do what they please? thanks

Although I think I've got a pretty good idea of what you are dealing with, posting pictures of your setup is best.
Likely your coop is violently undersized and under ventilated and that is why they won't roost inside the coop.

 

[lori_smith99]

Mine do the same thing! I have a run with the coop inside plus
laying boxes/ sleeping areas too. They still want to roost on top lol
I live in FL so it's not too big of deal for here...I just leave mine be

 

[perkolator]

It's not winter yet, so I'd guess they'll eventually go inside during those harsher conditions. Chickens have been sleeping up in the protection of trees long before us humans wanted to put them inside boxes. They'll usually seek out the highest roosting areas - and for your setup it's the coop's roof. If the run is secure from predators, why not let them be?

 

[Ridgerunner]

From what I found your average low is around 25 Fahrenheit, so your extremes can be a lot colder. They will be exposed to wind on top of your coop so I'd want them at least some place out of the wind. Inside your coop is probably the best place.

Their instinct is to sleep on the highest place they reasonably can. Reasonable to them, not you. That's why you want your roosts in the coop to be higher than the nests or anywhere else you don't want them to sleep. That same instinct may drive them to sleep in trees or on top of your coop. There are a lot of posts on this forum where chickens prefer to sleep on top of the coop or on perches in the run. Yours are not on any way unusual, but you should be able to train them to sleep inside the coop.

Would your hens know to move to a better place if the weather got bad? A better place could be on the ground next to your coop out of the wind. I'm not as sure that they are as helpless in the dark as some people think, I've seen mine do some things that question that. But I'm also not sure that they will so I'd want to train them to sleep in the coop.

This doesn't mean that there is anything wrong with your coop or the roosts, they may just prefer sleeping someplace else. But there might be. How many hens do you have? What does the inside of the coop look like? How are your roosts arranged? Photos might help. It's possible they may have trouble getting up to and down from the roosts. Mine generally fly up and down but yours might not have enough room to spread their wings and fly. How much natural light do they have inside the coop? They need to be able to see to put themselves to bed. Sometimes it gets too dark in the coop for that before it gets dark enough outside to tell them to go to bed. Do you have night lights lighting up the run so it doesn't get dark enough out there before it is too dark in the coop?

Sometimes you can have a bully that beats them up if they try to sleep in the coop so some sleep outside. That can be a cockerel or a hen. If they are all sleeping up on the roof without one or more inside this is not it.

What I'd do to retrain them is to wait until they are on the roof to catch them and lock them in the coop for the night. They are usually not that hard to catch in the dark but they may be awkward to reach. I use a long handled fish net when I need to. If you have some lights back there they can be more challenging to catch. It doesn't bother me if they get scared. I don't want them to think that the top of the coop is a safe place to sleep. When I do this I don't set them on the roosts in the coop, many people do. I set them on the coop floor and let them work out where they sleep in the dark. They do. My goal is not to get them to sleep on the roosts inside the coop, my goal is to get them to sleep in the coop.

Sometimes mine get the message after I lock them in there once or twice. Sometimes it takes over two weeks being consistent every night. Be consistent and they will get the message.

Good luck!