Ivy bullying chicks!

[Emojikitten]

Don't get me wrong, but Ivy is the nicest chicken you could ever meet. She likes to cuddle, she will eat out of your hand, and she will follow you around the yard. But we got new chicks, and we built them a new coop right next to Ivy's about 5 months ago. Yesterday, we moved them in with Ivy. Ivy, a white wyandotte, is nice to Emily, our Golden laced wyandotte, but she bullies and pecks Ash, our black sex link. She wont let them get any treats or bugs that crawl into the coop. Is there something wrong? Why is she pecking Ash? Why is she being nice to Emily? And how can I solve this?

 

[ame087192]

It just sounds like she’s the top of the pecking order.
I’ve got a Rhode island red who may as well be a turkey. We call her Big Mama. She is mean towards our 2 year old Easter Egger but they tend to get along well enough. We bought 4 chicks in April and were very good about slowly introducing them. But Big Mama would try to fight them regardless of how little they were. Now that the chicks are big enough to hold their own I tossed them all into the same run. Every night I let Big Mama our into the backyard so the other hens have a chance to eat and drink.
At some point I’m sure things will level out. The pecking order is always changing and pulling out feathers is just part of it. If it gets bad- put the aggressor in a small pen-‘chicken jail’. They tend to understand that.

 

[snow5164]

So funny I had a bossy rir I called big mama!!

Pecking order is hard for us to understand, if you take the time and watch you may learn the set up with your hens

 

[Emojikitten]

Thanks guys! Ivy has started to be a bit nicer to Ash. Ill be sure to watch after Ivy more often to make her the nice little baby she used to be.