I need help with some fighting chickens

[jzervas92]

Hey everyone, I seem to be having a problem with my chickens that I just can't solve. Recently my chickens have become EXTREMELY noisy. I don't mind the usual sounds, but they have gotten into screaming at the top of their lungs almost to the point of honking geese. I usually wouldn't mind this but my neighbors are pretty close to me and I can hear the chickens screaming from down the road. I just don't want anyone to complain because it is obnoxious. It seems to be happening every day or every other day and they do it nice and early in the morning. I thought maybe I had to many chickens so I got rid of three now I'm down to 9 chickens and two more might have to go if I don't figure this out. I noticed my light brahma and my Easter egger refuse to let any other chicken in the coop when they want to lay their eggs. It's gotten to the point now where no one will lay any eggs. I have 3 nesting boxes and I actually made two more but it doesn't seem to be helping. I run up to the coop and I don't see anything bothering them, and sometimes I even have to let them into the yard to shut them up. I really don't know what to do anymore I just want them to go back to normal.

 

[Ol Grey Mare]

Hey everyone, I seem to be having a problem with my chickens that I just can't solve. Recently my chickens have become EXTREMELY noisy. I don't mind the usual sounds, but they have gotten into screaming at the top of their lungs almost to the point of honking geese. I usually wouldn't mind this but my neighbors are pretty close to me and I can hear the chickens screaming from down the road. I just don't want anyone to complain because it is obnoxious. It seems to be happening every day or every other day and they do it nice and early in the morning. I thought maybe I had to many chickens so I got rid of three now I'm down to 9 chickens and two more might have to go if I don't figure this out. I noticed my light brahma and my Easter egger refuse to let any other chicken in the coop when they want to lay their eggs. It's gotten to the point now where no one will lay any eggs. I have 3 nesting boxes and I actually made two more but it doesn't seem to be helping. I run up to the coop and I don't see anything bothering them, and sometimes I even have to let them into the yard to shut them up. I really don't know what to do anymore I just want them to go back to normal.

I'm a bit confused as reading your post I don't see where there is any "fighting" involved - is there something more to the situation?

The bolded part is actually a part of your problem - you are, in essence, training your chickens (or, rather, they are training you) that causing a ruckus results in being rewarded by being let out into the yard. Unintentional training happens all the time, and usually to the negative. Chickens are loud - often this will prompt the keeper to go out and "do something" to quiet them down -- throw some scratch, let them out to range, etc - this is pretty standard conditional training that conditions the animal that x behavior=y response from you.

Ultimately, what you are describing is pretty normal chicken behavior.

 

[jzervas92]

I figured I wasn't helping the situation by letting them out but I've never heard chickens scream this loud. It's not even like its a couple of times, they'll scream for more then an hour non stop. The fighting part was where I said the light brahma and Easter egger refuse to let anyone inside the coop to lay an egg. I could have 6 nesting boxes open and they will fight and push all of the other chickens out of the coop. Sometimes they don't even want to use the boxes they just kick all of the other chickens out. Some of the chickens have actually stopped laying. They have plenty of space to roam in their run, I definitely feel like it's more than enough for 9 chickens. Sorry for the confusion.