missing chicken

[aolexa21]

I recently introduced 3 new chickens to my flock of 4. The 4 older girls were ganging up on the new polish top hat. They were all free ranging today and the tophat never made it back into the coop tonight. I can't seem to find her anywhere. Did they scare her away for good? Think she will come back in the morning? I'm worried and my 8 year old is heartbroken.

 

[BettyR]

I have a pen inside my chicken house that I put new additions in for a couple of weeks before adding them to the flock. It works great. The other chickens can see them but they can't touch. After a couple of weeks of seeing the new additions every day when I finally do turn them loose with the other chickens I have never had any problems.

Just throwing new chickens together will always cause problems in the flock.

I hope your lost girl finds her way home but if it where here at my house a chicken that doesn't make it into the chicken house at night is pretty much a lost cause. I don't know how it is where you live but the woods are so full of predators here it would be a miracle if it lived to see the sun rise.

 

[cstronks]

Next time you really have to be careful with introducing the birds. BettyR is on point...the birds must be given time to get acclimated with other birds. If you notice the birds ganging up on a certain bird, you have to restart the reintroduction process and make sure that they don't hurt the bird. Read up on these things before doing them.

 

[GingerJane]

How long has she been missing ?

 

[GingerJane]

How long like an hour? two hours? When was the last you saw her? Were you home all day where you could hear them?

 

[aolexa21]

We did have them seperated but next to each other for 30 days. We then put them together 3 days ago. I was home all day and they were all hanging out closely to each other free ranging. I went out around 5:30/ sun down and all the chickens but the top hat were roosting. I last saw her at 4:30. I looked all over our property and saw no sign. Poor girl!

 

[aolexa21]

I read up on all things chicken before doing them. I took all of the precautionary steps in introducing them as to not have any sick birds. They never hurt her just kind of showed her who was boss. She learned to keep her distance so I'm thinking when it was time to roost the close quarters intimidated her and she took off somewhere.

 

[hililyhilo]

I feel for you and I hope your girl comes back safe and sound. The same thing happened to me yesterday. I let my new Silkie rooster free-range with the rest of the flock and he went missing in the afternoon. I spent about an hour looking around for him with no results. He didn't come back by the time it was dark, and I felt very worried and sad for him. One of my concerns was that he didn't even know where the coop was since he's still so new to our place. At least your tophat knows where your coop is.

In any case, this morning, I heard the Silkie crow and located him right by our house! I'm hoping that your hen also has a safe night and presents herself in the morning. Good luck!

 

[MyPetNugget]

sorry about your chickie. Hope she comes back soon.

 

[GingerJane]

She roosted for the night in the woods (She spent the night in the woods crouched down hiding and sleeping) Let your chickens out htis morning in case she survived make sure to let them out.