Is a sanctuary of battered hens inevitable?

[CovidtimeQuail]

I have three hens that I'm thinking of starting a girls-only pen for. They are:

1. (No name, but Crazy Italian Hen seems to have stuck as a description) A beautiful big bird I've bred several times. She's been the trophy mount (prize) for several males and now hates them. She will chase them off at every opportunity.​

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2. Tina, the bird initially left for dead by one of the males I still have and intend to keep. She is amazingly sweet and trusting. Her motto is "Can't we all get along?" I have her along with the other two in this group because she is the glue that keeps them all peaceful. I also can't put her together with the roo that nearly killed her, since that roo has very specific tastes in hens.​

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3. Hoppy. As her name suggests, she has a broken, poorly healed foot. Best I can tell, she likes living. She can't get places quickly but gets along fine with Tina and tolerates the crazy Italian hen. (Everyone just tolerates the crazy Italian hen -- says something that the roos find her the most alluring though.) I can't keep Hoppy with a male as she risks getting injured.​

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All of them, when kept peaceful, lay eggs. The oldest is Crazy Italian hen and she's barely a year old.​

The question here is, is keeping a battered hen home inevitable as I raise quail? Is the only other option culling them? What have been others' experiences? If having a pen of battered hens is pretty normal, I'll go ahead and start mine now.

 

[FloorCandy]

I do not have a battered hen cage. I would cull the male that mauled the one, and I would probably cull crazy Italian hen. Hoppy can probably live in general pop fine, as they usually lay down to mate anyway. I wouldn’t keep a battered cage, too much work, better to get rid of the problems, or soon you will end up with multiple battered cages as the birds pile up. If I have a hen who looks overmated, I put her in the grow out where the hens usually tremendously outnumber the Roos. I keep Apollo there because he’s so small, I fear for him in male jail. he’s sweet and caring to the hens, has a quiet crow, and if he gets a mark on his face, I know I have a boy in there and I’ll check them all to find him. So his grow out is a safe zone.

 

[Nabiki]

I cull my overly aggressive birds. I don't need a battered hen home. A battered (and fried) boy home, maybe.

 

[CovidtimeQuail]

Not sure why I have such a hard time with culling these hens. It might be that there's such a long history with these girls. Tina would be fine in the gen pop (not with the picky roo), but Hoppy's energy is starting to decline, so it might be time to say goodbye.

I'm going to have to make a decision soon. I have to integrate 12 growing chicks into the rest of the flock in the next week or so.

 

[FloorCandy]

Not sure why I have such a hard time with culling these hens. It might be that there's such a long history with these girls. Tina would be fine in the gen pop (not with the picky roo), but Hoppy's energy is starting to decline, so it might be time to say goodbye.

I'm going to have to make a decision soon. I have to integrate 12 growing chicks into the rest of the flock in the next week or so.

I would cull the roo and crazy hen before you intro the chicks, you don’t want the chicks injured or learning the behaviors.

 

[CovidtimeQuail]

I would cull the roo and crazy hen before you intro the chicks, you don’t want the chicks injured or learning the behaviors.

The roo was culled to make room for a roo from the new batch. Hoppy the injured hen was given to a perfect family to become an indoor pet. (Even though she's alone, she's safe and will have people attention all the time. Last I heard, she was cuddling with some rescue chicken chicks.)

Crazy hen is still there. She's still crazy and the new birds are really cautious around her. Fortunately, I built my coop with slide in dividers. Her next door apartment mates are horny roo and his six girls. Today, I temporarily slid in the plexiglass divider instead of the wooden one and her neighbor was going crazy trying to get to her. She hates him. Suddenly, she was really nice to the birds she's with. Let's see how long that lasts.

 

[007Sean]

Not sure why I have such a hard time with culling these hens. It might be that there's such a long history with these girls. Tina would be fine in the gen pop (not with the picky roo), but Hoppy's energy is starting to decline, so it might be time to say goodbye.

I'm going to have to make a decision soon. I have to integrate 12 growing chicks into the rest of the flock in the next week or so.

It's called, 'you have become emotionally attached' to them! That's one reason I don't name my birds and another is I couldn't remember 352 names!

It's hard to do but I would cull them!

 

[CovidtimeQuail]

It's called, 'you have become emotionally attached' to them! That's one reason I don't name my birds and another is I couldn't remember 352 names!

It's hard to do but I would cull them!

They really don't have names. It would just be a lot less of a story if I called them Quail 1 and Quail 2.

Crazy hen though, ought to have a name. I am emotionally attached: I'm the one who failed her. She was in my first hatch. Before I got better about culling the roos, she was the roo "prize." One would jump on her, then the other roo would make a point by jumping on her. Rinse, lather, repeat.

She's a consistent layer; she has markings I want to continue in the line. Fortunately, I checked on her today and she seems to think whatever she has is better than being thrown into the cage with one of her aggressors (I kept him too. He breeds big birds and is the "bad boy" the more assertive hens go to if they can't behave in their group. Dictators have their merits.)

For the time being, three permanent pens with happy birds. I'll cull the extra grow-outs in a week or so. But yes, I was not cut out for farm life. I'm trying so hard not to make eye contact with a particularly friendly roo in the grow-out.

 

[kurby22]

They really don't have names. It would just be a lot less of a story if I called them Quail 1 and Quail 2.

Crazy hen though, ought to have a name. I am emotionally attached: I'm the one who failed her. She was in my first hatch. Before I got better about culling the roos, she was the roo "prize." One would jump on her, then the other roo would make a point by jumping on her. Rinse, lather, repeat.

She's a consistent layer; she has markings I want to continue in the line. Fortunately, I checked on her today and she seems to think whatever she has is better than being thrown into the cage with one of her aggressors (I kept him too. He breeds big birds and is the "bad boy" the more assertive hens go to if they can't behave in their group. Dictators have their merits.)

For the time being, three permanent pens with happy birds. I'll cull the extra grow-outs in a week or so. But yes, I was not cut out for farm life. I'm trying so hard not to make eye contact with a particularly friendly roo in the grow-out.

I have a similar issue...I was definitely NOT cut out for farm life. I get way too emotionally attached even though most of them don't even have names! There are a few that are so awful that I have limited guilt getting rid of them...but I have five cages full of quail for a reason haha. It gets easier with time because they die at the drop of a hat...but culling isn't in my DNA. Quail (or at least hatching them myself) may not be something I can legitimately do long term because of that haha. Might just need to buy hens and enjoy them! Sighhh. There does seem to be less drama when they are of the same coloring. I had a bunch of hens in with my two roos, one a tuxedo and one is silver...the hens are all pansy fees, a falb fee, and there were only two tuxedo hens. The tuxedo guy focused almost entirely on just those two ladies and they were SO over it. I moved them to the other hen den and now everyone gets a normal amount of male attention. Silly birds. I did bring a couple of my "injured" quail indoors to a smaller guinea pig cage for awhile, but I have found that they get around alright in gen pop now that they have healed up. I thought the limping would create issues, but it hasn't. I do have a hen den that is some of my more anxiety ridden hens that don't enjoy male attention. Poor ladies!

 

[FloorCandy]

I have a similar issue...I was definitely NOT cut out for farm life. I get way too emotionally attached even though most of them don't even have names! There are a few that are so awful that I have limited guilt getting rid of them...but I have five cages full of quail for a reason haha. It gets easier with time because they die at the drop of a hat...but culling isn't in my DNA. Quail (or at least hatching them myself) may not be something I can legitimately do long term because of that haha. Might just need to buy hens and enjoy them! Sighhh. There does seem to be less drama when they are of the same coloring. I had a bunch of hens in with my two roos, one a tuxedo and one is silver...the hens are all pansy fees, a falb fee, and there were only two tuxedo hens. The tuxedo guy focused almost entirely on just those two ladies and they were SO over it. I moved them to the other hen den and now everyone gets a normal amount of male attention. Silly birds. I did bring a couple of my "injured" quail indoors to a smaller guinea pig cage for awhile, but I have found that they get around alright in gen pop now that they have healed up. I thought the limping would create issues, but it hasn't. I do have a hen den that is some of my more anxiety ridden hens that don't enjoy male attention. Poor ladies!

I find that making sure you have a variety of all your colors in each hatch group so they are used to all of the colors from hatch. I’ve noticed that the tuxes and silvers tend to pick on the scarlets and Italians, they don’t like gingers I guess, but if I have reds in their hatch group, they usually end up ok. I was culling and eating my males, and selling them as snake food, but I’ve found my snake food customers are terrible about being on time and not showing at all, now I take them 90 minutes away to an auction every few weeks. I make less this way, but it’s nice to dump 100 birds/chicks of various ages and genders, all at once, and getting 80-90+ bux.