Picked on hen

[Mother hen56]

Hi all, I am very new to keeping chickens, I have only three bantam hens and have just learnt how to stop broody bantams. Now I have another problem, the last one in the pecking order is being picked on most of the time by one off the others, can any one help and advise what to do
Motherhen56.

 

[sunflour]

glad you have joined us, but sorry about the issue.

Make sure you have enough space in their home so the victim can have room to roam and escape if needed. And that feeder and fount are large enough to access from all sides and are separated.

If this is aggressive, causing injury then you will have to intervene. If it is just pecking order issues, she'll learn to deal with it.

First year one of mine was picked on by others and bluekote spray stopped pecking at raw areas. More space in the run solved it for me.

 

[TwoCrows]

Hello there and welcome to BYC!

As Sunflour has suggested, make sure they have enough room. Cramped chickens pick on each other. Give them things to do...free ranging, ladders, mirrors, seed pecking blocks, hanging cabbages or apples.

Make sure the bird that is being picked on is healthy. Other flock members know when a bird is sick and they try and run them off to protect the flock. So give this bird a once over to make sure she has no health issues. If they need to be wormed, do so.

Also, make sure you have enough nest boxes. Sometimes 1 to 4 hens is not enough. Sometimes 1 to 3 or even 1 for ever 2 is better. Depends on your flock.

The lowest in the order can get picked on a lot. Make sure you have several feed and water stations out so she can get enough to eat and drink. They may be starving her out.

If all else fails, you can use pinless peepers on the meanies. (generally there is one that starts it and is the most aggressive) or you can jail the meanies for a while in a wire dog crate. Jail can do wonders for the attitude of a bird. Isolation for a week is lonely!

And always cover up all wounds with blu-kote. Birds can kill birds with wounds when they see skin and blood.

Good luck and welcome to our flock!

 

[Book Em Danno25]

Welcome to BYC!!

I'm glad you joined the flock!!

Many adventures await you and your flock. If you have any questions, feel free to ask around!!

-Turkenstein25

 

[drumstick diva]

2 Crow covered it all, I'll just say Welcome to Backyard chickens, very glad you joined the flock

 

[NickyKnack]

Hello!

Welcome to BYC and the coop! There's a lot of great peeps here! Feel free to ask lots of questions. But most of all, make yourself at home. I'm so glad you decided to join the BYC family. I look forward to seeing you around BYC.
Good luck with your girls!

 

[BantamFan4Life]

Welcome to BYC! I'm glad you joined us!

 

[nj2wv]

welcome to BYC !!