Do you have friendly chickens? If not ask yourself, do I hold them and pet them every day or do I give them no attention. Chickens have feelings too. When they are chicks give them lots of love and care, because they will grow up not fearing you, they will be your friend! Do not stop caring for them, for chickens are known to turn mean and forget their owner! They also might not be as nice if they are stressed. Chickens can get stressed out if there is a predator near by or if there is a loud noise, chickens dislike loud noises. You will know when your chickens are friendly because they will come up to you, not run away from you and allow you to hold them. When they do this you will know you have done a good job at making your chickens friendly!!!
I love my chickens as pets also, all of them have names, as of now I'm up to 30 chickens (I think LOL) All of them are friendly except for the 4 new seramas I have, but I only got them the other day, I need to start handling them more but I'm letting them get settled in their new environment first. My white leghorn is my sweetheart, she's been wandering around in our plantroom & kitchen ALOT b/c she had bumble foot in both feet, we had bandages on her - so she totally was spoiled, but her owner before us spoiled her and her sister (her sister whispytail RIP got taken by a fox). I also have 3 RIR's that are pretty tame (meaning I don't have to chase them to pick them up & they always come to me for treats) same with my 8 golden laced wyandottes. I also have 4 month olds (some mixes, bantams, australorps, jersey giants, nankins/OEs, silkies & mixes) they are also really tame. I do believe there comes a time when you CAN have TOO MANY chickens though, b/c for me, having 30 right now is a chore lol I don't have a job right now so I've been incubating eggs back to back selling day old chicks or week old chicks & even fertile eggs. You have TOO MANY chickens when you can't at least come face to face w/almost all of them either everyday or every other day; right now all of my 4 month olds are sick with runny noses & some smell kinda putrid (I introduced 4 new ones into the flock a while back from a friend who I thought was trusthworthy - turns out he has like over 70+ chickens so he can't tend to that many w/a full time job & monitor the health of all of his). So I've had the "teenager" chickens on Liquamyacin shots, already done one round 2 days ago, gonna give some more meds tonight, of course our weather here isn't helping, the high today was like 70 degrees, and the low tonight is gonna be 28....seriously screwed up lol
We only have five chickens so its easier for us to give them all attention and they are happy chickens! Spoiling them with treats helps! haha they get warm oatmeal almost everyday especially on really cold days. It's to the point where they know what bowl we put the oatmeal and if someone is carrying it, empty or full, they will follow you around the yard until you put it down LOL! One of our girls we got after our other 4 and she was kinda getting picked on ALOT so we would go sit out there to watch them and if we would sit on our buckets (chairs for the run ) she would instantly jump on our laps as soon as we sat down and just sit there for awhile until she was ready to go back down lol so since day one she has definitely been very friendly and always follows us around. Our other girls took a little bit to get used to us but now they will jump on our laps for treats or just to be pet, and sometimes we can get them to jump on our arms to! You will always know when Darla (our Buff Orpington) is about to jump on your lap/back because she has a tendency to peck your butt/back right before she does! She's silly she definitely has a great personality, but all of our chickens do and we love them and spoil them like they are our kids! We wish we could have more!
I have 5 chicks. 11 weeks old. I got them at 3 weeks old and handled them daily. If they think I have dried meal worms then they come running. I talk to them but they do not generally come to me and when I enter their pen the run away to a corner. I have tried handling them as they have grown but it is the last thing they want. I have a light Sussex, buff orp, a maran, a Rhode Island Red, and an unknown. They are unsexed at present. Any advice
