**new with photos** buff orps are pecking each other to death

[JSC]

Ours were starting to peck at one another in their cage (they had out grown it since the chick days) so I had to put the coop building up high on the list. We got them in their 8x6 coop and they are busy doing other things now. The run should be done today or tomorrow,that should give them alot of new areas to explore.

Good Luck!

 

[crooked stripe]

I received 15 buff orp straight run the first week of Feb. When they where a month old they started the major pecking thing. I had 8 in separate cages trying to stop the pecking. I lost 3 from being pecked to death. Every time I tried to reintroduce them the same thing happened. I started culling the most aggressive ones. I am now down to 8 of the most peaceful birds of the bunch. One roo and 7 hens. I bought 4 white leghorns to up the egg production and they are 4 weeks now. I hope they get along when the time comes to put them together. I was really disappointed in the out come of the buff orps. Every thing I read about the bo's said they where peaceful and friendly. I now must disagree. John

 

[tazzy]

my husband has raised buff orps before, along with other breeds, and he says the buff orps are normally the most gentle, docile roos and hens of any that he's seen.

I don't know what happened with our bunch. So far, so good with the new roo. We pulled the meanest hen out of the coop and put her in a separate area. We'll try reintroducing her later on. Maybe. She was really mad when we pulled her out last night. Started stalking around in her cage (it's the 5' x 3' cage where we raised our chicks) and cackled her disappointment about being removed from the hen house.

the roo is really docile, even though we didn't get him as a chick. he lets us hold him and pet him without a struggle. he's apparently having quite a bit of fun in the hen house, however. he's been a busy roo.

 

[tazzy]

just wanted to say that things are good so far, three days into adding the roo to our henhouse. we've kept out the meanest hen in a separate area and not sure what we're going to do with her. I can't kill her. I don't know what the solution is. She's the one doing all the pecking on the chickens tho. So I don't want her back in with them.

The remaining ones are very happy with the situation, from all appearances. And the rooster is letting us know every day that he's there. The cock-a-doodle-doo's coming from the henhouse are frequent!

 

[okto]

from your description, the flock is at peace

dont think of it as "killing", think of it as "eating"

i think that if you add that mean hen back in to the flock, your problems will start once again

good lunk

 

[snowydiamonds]

Thanks for the recipe, Fivebigreds Our feed orders get stuck in the mail often, weather permitting so that is going to come in handy!

 

[chickentownUSA]

IHi Everyone I am new at this chat thing but my main reason for signing up was the same problem. I have a small flock of 5 birds been together for 4 years now all of a sudden 4 of the 5 are stomping and pecking 1 of the girls. So upsetting to see was wondering what I could do about it too! I will try some of the suggestions too!! Thanks!

 

[stilwellchick]

Tazzy, you may try putting your new roo in the detention area with the bad girl hen for a couple of days, she may tone down a little and be glad to get in with the other girls to get away from his attention. Maybe she will decide he's the boss. Keep us posted.

 

[tazzy]

thanks everyone! we could try the roo trick, putting him with her alone for a few days (all that attention might go to her head tho!) and then putting her back in and watching her VERY carefully to see how she behaves. It might get better, too, as soon as this rain stops and my DH can build the outdoor part of our run. I'm going to go outside now and take pics of our chickens and coop to see if anyone has any suggestions...we took down the cabbage because it was attracting those flying bugs. nats? I'm losing it. can't think of things!

we need to get some fresh cabbage. they loved that stuff.

I just figured out how to post pics here, so here is a pic of my babies when we first got them. one week and two weeks old (from two different breeders)

and this was always the bravest chicken, so I wonder if she's the one that is the meany today? She was completely fearless of us even as a chick!

 

[tazzy]

Okay, I'm back. I took a lot of pics of my coop and the hens and our gorgeous new roo.

This is our chicken coop. It's 14' wide and about 8-10 feet deep. It's next to our barn:

And this is the area beside it that my husband is going to make an outdoor run area that they can access freely. It will have fencing on the sides and the top to protect the chickens from hawks, which are common in our area. It's the flagged area. I estimate that it's about 16 feet by 16 feet:

And here is the chicken hospital, so to speak (also known as our dog run/kennel when we have to put our golden retrievers somewhere if work is being done inside the house. our dogs live inside with us 99.9% of the time.) You can see the raw red butt on one chicken and another in her makeshift nest. There are three healing chickens in here and they're doing much better than a few days ago than when we first separated them. they were bloody and icky then and now they're just red. we're putting this purple spray antibiotic stuff on them to help them heal but it's worn off and they seem to be okay for now with no open wounds. we're trying to only apply it when we have to since it kind of attracts the attention of the other chickens:

here's the mean chicken, isolated in the breeder thingee where we kept our chickens when they were babies:

Here's our three nesting boxes with a hen on one nest:

Here's our new roo with his hens:

And a closeup of the gorgeous guy. He's very docile toward people but in charge of the hens, no question: