I separated my hens and now they fight?!?!

[TaaDaaGina]

HELP!! One of my hens (I have two adults), she was the Alpha, needed to heal from a wound so I had her in a pen and the other in the chicken coop like usual. I THOUGHT they were BESTIES!! I raised them together since birth and now they do not know each other and I brought the one in to see the other periodically? I am besides myself they resemble a cock fight and I do not understand. It was the docile one who started the fighting - the Alpha seems to be cool now that she is healed.

All of this is going on at the same time I bought and raised together 2 chicks and a gosling - which everyone (the babies from the adults) is separated at night - but free ranging in my big yard all together without problems... I am building a bigger chicken coop for ALL the birds- but I do not know what to do when I combine them all. I am now SUPER glad I bought the gosling because she is (now) bigger than the adult hens and does a GREAT job protecting the chicks... So that is taken care of but what about the older hens?!?!

YIKES!! ANY thoughts?!

 

[rosemarythyme]

Was the injured bird penned in line of sight of the other bird? How long was she gone for?

 

[TaaDaaGina]

Hello -- No she was not penned in sight - she was in the house. She was gone for a week - with a few times of my bringing the outside hen in to see the inside hen.

 

[rosemarythyme]

Guess that was long enough for the hens to no longer recognize each other, so you're basically going to have to reintegrate them as if they're strangers.

Doesn't help now, but in the future - if you ever need to pen a bird for treatment, best to keep them somewhere in line of sight with the other bird(s). I had a pullet that was in isolation for 6 weeks, and reintegrating her was as easy as opening the door, because she was housed in the run the whole time.

 

[TaaDaaGina]

WOW... Who knew?! They WERE such besties, it never crossed my mind that with just the two of them - they would forget each other... Live and LEARN. I am supervising sleep overs in my room... And letting them free range during the day with chicken coop time outs for the aggressor => Ughhhhhh (If this did not happen during COVID - I would NOT have the time for all of this...) Thank you for your wisdom!! Much appreciated!

 

[rosemarythyme]

Good luck getting them back together! They should eventually be fine with one another again, just by spending time together, but might need to tussle it out to reestablish who is on top.