nighttime chicken party in an unlit coop? Is this normal?

[horsejody]

Some of my younger chickens and my duck like to hang out outside until well after dark. It's funny because the older roo will be inside on the roost screaming for them to get inside. They ignore him and keep partying in the dark run. They will also go outside in the dark at 5:30am when I open the pop doors to the run. Kids these days.

 

[ChooksChick]

Quote:
So, chickens aren't night-blind after all?

Oh, I think they are...I have had to go herd them in when the light was out for one reason or another, and I watched one hen walk into a wall...

 

[Guinea Goonie]

Chickens can see the light spectrum in a field that we can not. The sun coming around the horizon gives off a specific part of the spectrum that chickens can see.

This is why your roos crow so darn early in the morning. Some hens will go out and try for bugs and such even if it is pitch black to the human eye.

 

[farmgirlwanabe]

We've had our chickens for a few months now. In the last couple of weeks I've heard our roo crowing around 2 am. I have a heat lamp on out there right now as I just introduced 4 chicks hatched from an incubator so I think this must be the reason. I was told that the heat lamp wouldn't disturb them at all but perhaps it does.