Lost my sweet girl

[A-TeamMama]

Diamond isn't broody. Today she stayed with the girls for a few hours. During that time my baby was napping and I was able to stay in the chicken yard for awhile. I discovered that she may be leaving due to being picked on. I witnessed my EE peck her so hard she cried. My husband just put the roost in their coop. Prior the girls just snuggled together on a large flat platform area. I'm wondering if the roost sparked a strong hierarchy. And if Diamond is now lowest man. Any thoughts? Should I take the roost out? Can I intervene? Would adding a couple more bantams help? (We were going to in the spring)

 

[Violetsfeathers]

Diamond isn't broody. Today she stayed with the girls for a few hours. During that time my baby was napping and I was able to stay in the chicken yard for awhile. I discovered that she may be leaving due to being picked on. I witnessed my EE peck her so hard she cried. My husband just put the roost in their coop. Prior the girls just snuggled together on a large flat platform area. I'm wondering if the roost sparked a strong hierarchy. And if Diamond is now lowest man. Any thoughts? Should I take the roost out? Can I intervene? Would adding a couple more bantams help? (We were going to in the spring)

Are there more than one roost? Of so is one higher than the other? I think being the only bantam is hard on her, maybe put up a branch in a corner for her to roost on.
When we got bantams we had them in a separate flock from the big chickens we had. Getting more bantams and having their very own bantam coop would probably make her happy.
We got a rooster with our big chicken batch because he was a freebie, roosters sort of act like a sheepdog. They keep the hens together and take them to nice places in the yard (if they're free range) plus you can always tell where the chickens are because of the crowing.
If your chickens are in a pen, Diamond has nowhere to get away from being pecked. So of course she escapes! If the chickens free range she can run away and hide, also all of your hens will be happier.
I think if she has her own roost and they all free range she will stay, or at least stop disappearing.
My chickens don't go far from the coop and they always come back to lay an egg and sleep.

 

[A-TeamMama]

Thank you VioletsFeathers. Our house is built on a foam block basement. Our chickens have always free ranged. However, they discovered the foam block and began pecking away. Most of it is covered. But the sides of the basement foam is partially exposed. So around the same my husband built the three tier roost (half still sleep on the platform floor at the bottom of the roost) he fenced in their yard.
Now after reading VioletsFeathers post I'm thinking that must be why she's now disappearing. I'm not sure of my solution. I will make a small Diamond size roost for her. I can introduce her to it. But she hasn't slept with the girls since Sunday nights disappearance. Hope it works. Next project is a bantam coop.

 

[Violetsfeathers]

Your welcome good luck!

 

[Violetsfeathers]

How are things?

 

[A-TeamMama]

Miss Diamond is still with us. She has been changing where she sleep often. Of our two roosts she can be found on either the high or low one. But lately she's been sleeping alone on top of the nesting boxes. The last three nights I've left her. I sometimes intervene and place her in a cozy looking spot between warm chickens, but it sometimes backfires and she gets pecked

.
I have a curiosity. Maybe you can help. Are chickens born with all their eggs like humans? Diamond hasn't layed a single egg since she's been getting picked on. Now the cold is here. I don't know when she'll start laying, but I was wondering if she'll continue laying even later in life than most due to his hiatus she's been on.

 

[Violetsfeathers]

I think the yolks are there, they are just really small. I have a chicken named muffin, she alway looks awful and scraggly lookin. All the other chickens peck on her so she is always scared, she has never lauded an egg and she is two years old.
How old is Diamond?
The egg production also slows down a LOT in the winter.