people with house chickens

[Sylvester017]

I am learning so much from BYC. Has anyone out there ever been able to potty train a chicken? I see in some of the pictures that the chickens are wearing diapers. I understand chickens follow simple commands. Is it possible to potty train them? I definitely would get two silkies so they would have their much needed chicken socialization.

The basic answer is "no." Chickens poop about every 15-20 minutes. They'd be running to the potty station several times an hour!

However, one gentleman claimed his rooster became potty trained just by watching his cat use the litter tray. Who knows? Maybe you'll be one of the lucky ones but I have serious doubts.

We used a chicken diaper on all of our inhouse juveniles (not chicks) until they were done with quarantine and old enough to be integrated into the main flock. All the chickens at first go backwards or jump wildly trying to take off the diaper the first few times but our juvenile Silkie (about 3 mos old) took to it in just a few minutes. Have to be careful not to secure it too tight or the chicken walks backwards or sits down and won't walk or if too loose the chicken will wriggle out of it. My DH nudged the chickens from behind to get them to walk forward - sometimes he put a firm hand on the backstrap and gently forced the Silkie to walk forward for a couple minutes. She was a smarty and caught on fast - and with treats she moved like grease lightning to get to them. You'll get the hang of it and so will the chicken after a couple trial and errors. It frustrated us trying to figure out how to hold the chicken to get them still enough but the more we did it the easier it got. At first two of us were trying to hold the Silkie and the other put on the diaper. Now both my DH and I can do it without each other's help. I watched a youtube video a couple years ago to learn how to make diapers and how to hold the chickens to put them on. Because of wearing diapers so young our Silkie got used to all the handling and the bathroom sink vent washes and blowdries. We can hold her in any position today (even the vet can) and she just lets us without fighting it.

Just be sure to wash the vent area and blowdry warm before putting to roost in their indoor pen. Gives the diaper area time to breathe air overnight. Sometimes watery poop means having to change out the diaper during the day. I washed the diapers every night with baby shampoo and hung in the shower to dry overnight. We have 4 diapers on hand - 2 small and 2 large. The only chicken we had too stubborn to move in her diaper was our Ameraucana. She absolutely refused to wear it and after 2 weeks of her sitting around and moping we gave up putting one on her. We just kept her in the quarantine pen rather than let her walk around the house pooping every 15 mins. We have tile floors so cleanup generally is easy but sometimes a chicken missed and some got on a throw rug. I kept a lot of cleaner and 1/2 sheet paper towels on hand. Silkie poop is smaller so a cocktail size napkin was enough to pick up most of her poops.

 

[gonzochick]

I haven't mastered putting Buddha in her diaper yet....but she has escaping it down to a science! Lol! Oh well, we will keep trying. I want her to be eligible for a therapy animal program for the hospital I work at and having the diaper will be essential! We will get there. She is so sweet and docile while I put it on her, and hastily shrugs it off as soon as I put her down! Lol!

 

[subhanalah]

I haven't mastered putting Buddha in her diaper yet....but she has escaping it down to a science! Lol! Oh well, we will keep trying. I want her to be eligible for a therapy animal program for the hospital I work at and having the diaper will be essential! We will get there. She is so sweet and docile while I put it on her, and hastily shrugs it off as soon as I put her down! Lol!

Sounds like it may be too big for her?

 

[Sylvester017]

I haven't mastered putting Buddha in her diaper yet....but she has escaping it down to a science! Lol! Oh well, we will keep trying. I want her to be eligible for a therapy animal program for the hospital I work at and having the diaper will be essential! We will get there. She is so sweet and docile while I put it on her, and hastily shrugs it off as soon as I put her down! Lol!

Our "clever pearl" (that's what her name Minmae means) was a wonderful escape artist. We'd get one leg through the strap and as we put her other leg through the other side she'd already have the first leg out again! Sometimes she'd manage to get both 5-toed feet into the same side! It was fun and funny figuring the best way to get her into her first diaper. Each time gets a little easier until it doesn't take two people to get a wiggly Silkie into a diaper. Today we can handle her and put her into any position - so can the vet - because we handled her so much from 3 to 6 months old in diapers. Sometimes the leg switching from side to side went on 10 times with my DH and I laughing trying to get her in. It took me making 3 diapers before I got the fit right - the first one was so loose she walked right out of it. The 2nd one was a little better but I made it too snug. Finally I made the straps adjustable and used an extra velcro across the top straps so she wouldn't wiggle her wings out. It is worth the struggles to get them used to the diaper and especially for the therapy program for the hospital. With all the breeds we've had getting a good fit on a Silkie diaper is a challenge with those slippery downy feathers being so soft.

 

[Ponyfeather]

Do you have any instructions on how to make a chicken-diaper?

Also maybe a food reward after you have the diaper on might help encourage Budda to wear it?

 

[subhanalah]

Do you have any instructions on how to make a chicken-diaper?

Also maybe a food reward after you have the diaper on might help encourage Budda to wear it?

I'm trying to teach my chicken to lay an egg for me...hasn't worked yet lol.

 

[MaddiesMum]

Goodness, I have to agree, silkies definitely make the diapering process as tricky as they can, all those TOES! I'm getting better at it, but man was it easier with my little polish Maddie. I had never even thought toes could be an issue until these girls lol! As soon as I think it's on right, I check around, and NOPE, caught on those precious toes.. plus sometimes as they're walking the upper toes will catch on the elastic and get caught up again lol.
For the most part everything is fine, but it's just funny to see someone mention what I've been battling the past bit hahaha

 

[Sylvester017]

Do you have any instructions on how to make a chicken-diaper?

Also maybe a food reward after you have the diaper on might help encourage Budda to wear it?

I used a youtube.com video and typed "how to make a chicken diaper" in the search bar. chickenmom video was the bantam pattern I used because she was the only one at the time that showed how to make one 3 years ago. I see there are a few more video additions by others since then. You may find a pattern you like. I never liked the pre-made chicken diapers at $15 to $20 each and decided to make my own out of scrap chicken-patterned material I had left over from decorating my kitchen. I never felt comfortable that purchashed diapers were going to fit a Silkie properly as their fluffy feathers present a challenge and 2 Silkies can be two different sizes - I had one that weighed 2-lbs and one that weighed 2.5-lbs. Our juvenile Silkie wears a slightly smaller diaper than a fully mature Silkie.

PLEASE watch the youtube videos on making diapers first before reading my post so my notes and instructions will make sense to you.

I did not use velcro because the fluffy Silkie feathers stick to velcro so either large snaps or (only if you are very careful) a large strong safety pin (not the easily bent flimsy ones) to hold the two straps together over the top shoulders (don't sew these shoulder straps together because it will make it harder to get the Silkie into the contraption but I use a large strong safety pin to hold the shoulder straps secure after putting it on). I prefer using safety pins because it makes the straps more easily adjustable as the Silkie grows where permanent snaps sewed on the elastic means having to remove them and re-sew them back on later. I used soft underwear elastic for the straps (not too narrow and not too wide) and it is more comfortable an elastic than material-covered elastic like some of the pre-made purchased diaper designs (the less complicated the design the less to trap fluffy Silkie feathers). Silkie's fluffy feathers pretty much take care of covering up the exposed soft elastic straps. Buy the soft elastic in the color closest to the Silkie's feather color if available (I could only find white but even on our Black Silkie it got covered up by her fluffy feathering and wasn't seen and even the safety pin wasn't visible). Sometimes we pinned too high up on the shoulders and sometimes too low on the back and by watching how the Silkie walked told us whether we needed to reposition the safety pin. I prefer elastic over the shoulders rather than the diapers that have elastic straps going under the Silkie's belly where their toes get tangled as they walk. I cut sandwich baggie tops off and pinned them with a couple very small safety pins (from the outside) to the diaper pouch to catch all the poop - I added heavier janitorial paper towel pieces and scissor cut to fit inside the sandwich baggie and pinned both the baggie and towel to the diapper pouch. It helps to absorb the moisture of the more liquidy poo (chickenmom used panty liners but I found them too small to be effective) - but I'm sure you'll have your own preferences for the details of your own chicken diapers. I found that I needed to gather the pouch at the back so I used some of the soft elastic to gather a bit of the slack in the pouch - need a sewing machine and some knowledge of sewing elastic on a machine to gather it properly.

Sorry to be so graphic but you DID ask about making diapers LOL Always make sure the vent is adequately covered over securely by the poop pouch. The baggie and paper with the poo are tossed out at end of use. Again some people use velcro to attach the plastic liners but it just didn't work for us with so much Silkie fluff in the way. We pre-made a bunch of trimmed baggies and scissor-cut pieces of paper towels ahead of time and kept the assembled sets in a small decorator chicken box so we could find it easily each day if we didn't put it back in its usual place! If I ever make more of chickenmom diapers I will use heavy but pliable plastic to sew right into the pouch piece so I don't have to deal with baggies just to see if it makes it any easier for cleanup (although I like the baggies and paper towels to un-pin and then easily dispose the whole baggie full of poop). Also I made the elastic straps two continuous strips like Dayseykinsaj and used a strong safety pin to attach the straps together at the shoulders instead of with the velcro like chickenmom. Silkie feathers don't do well around sticky velcro strips.

Because a chicken can poop up to 4 times an hour I don't suggest holding a Silkie while in her diaper. Allowing the Silkie to be petted and touched is okay but lifting the Silkie and setting on someone's lap or holding her can push trapped poop into the Silkie's skin and butt quills or worse come leaking out of the diaper pouch - and face it the smell can be bad on some of the poops. There's relatively no odor on a well secured diaper but touching or pushing the poop pouch can disturb and release some unwanted odor. Don't know how this will work for a therapy chicken that people want to hold and handle so you will have to indicate no holding or sitting on laps and I'm sure therapy patients will understand. After all, just having a cute pet in the vicinity is therapy in itself! Children especially can really be gentle at petting if explained the reason for only touching and not holding a small animal.

The diaper will hold some odor by end of day so must be washed nightly - I used baby shampoo because it is gentler than harsher detergents. I quickly found that one diaper wasn't enough and made an extra for midday change if the Silkie got the runs which can happen especially with fresh produce/fruit given as a treat. We got so used to the routine of diapers for 3 months on our juvenile 3 month old Silkie that my DH was able to handle her changes and nightly butt shampoos and blowdries when I had to be gone a couple of days. My post has little hints that most of the videos don't tell you about so hope this helps. Feel free to PM me if you have any more questions that I missed.

Smiles

 

[PBGGG]

Finn is the toughest little rooster I have ever seen! I had him outside for a little bit today, just walking around through the yard with me (not the duck yard, and he wasn't in a cage, just free ranging). The next door rooster, Rooster #2, came over, and Finn poofed himself out so big I didn't even recognize him! They fought for a minute, and when #2 got scared and ran back home, Finn CHASED him through the woods back to his place!! I caught them fighting again, and I picked Finn up and brought him home. I am just so proud of him now, that he defended himself and his property! Go Finn! (actually finn, don't go anywhere because I'm already scratched up from that and you are so lucky my camera didn't scratch!)

 

[Nuggetirl]

I have three indoor chickens, though they stay in their cage for the most part. Maybe someday they will be diapered, but for now the dogs would absolutely destroy them.