- May 1, 2014
- 47
- 8
- 24
My name is Mimi, I own 6 Rhode Island Red chickens, 5 hens, 1 rooster. They are all cage free, free range, and they get to fly, flap, scratch, dig, peck, and crow/cackle as they please. I live on 1/2 acre in central Arizona. They get into everything, and when I'm working out in the yard, they are right there with me to protect me from spiders, cock roaches, scorpions, baby snakes, lizards, and all other manner of small critter they deem tasty. One thing I have found I have to protect them from is STYROFOAM. They seem to love it. The insulation under the house is made from Styrofoam and they got hold of one sheet of it and ate it till it was gone. I don't think it will hurt them, but it's not good for them so I watch now and don't let any blow into the yard, and I have blocked their access to the crawl space under the house. They seemed to love to go under there to keep cool, and this winter, they had a nest under there where one chicken was setting. Well, after a month of freezing her butt off under there, and no eggs hatched, she decided to abandon the nest. Thank God she did! So now I'll have to provide some other kind of "setting" area for them because they can't get under the house anymore. I have some 55 gallon cardboard barrels I plan to waterproof and set up as setting bins. They have a coop, with 4 nesting boxes, but they don't like them for some reason. They will sleep in them, but lay their eggs on the ground in the straw. Yes, I've tried putting the straw in the boxes, but they still don't like it. My chickens seem to have a mind of their own and do what they deem best. So, I just try and go along with whatever they seem to want, and keep them happy. And they are....happy.
and Welcome To BYC! Always good to have happy chickens ! Sounds like your chickens are doing a good job keeping the bugs and stuff under control, good girls! Ya, chickens like styrafoam, who knows why it seems tasty to them. Putting trick nests outside works well if your birds hide nests, the drums are a nice idea and things like 5 gallon buckets, old dog houses, plastic garbage cans etc all make nice nests to fool the girls into thinking they are sneakier than you are, just leave a couple of fake eggs in there and collect the good eggs out of the nests. X2 it is kind of odd they are sleeping in the nesting boxes as older birds, you do want the roosts to be higher than the boxes and easy to get on off of, and the boxes should have a nice lip on them to keep the straw/shavings in and dark and secluded... you could post pictures in the Coop/Run design forum for ideas on why your birds don't like the coop roosts and nests. 
