Polish won't go into coop

[trinity2883]

My 10 and 9 week old chicks have been full-time outside with their 26-week old sister for the past 3ish weeks and all of them have been going into the coop on their own at dusk for the past week...except for our Polish girl. She simply stays out in the run squawking frantically until we go to close the coop door and manually put her inside.

We want to go camping and add an automatic door...is there some better way to get her to start going with the others at dusk? I know her visibility is poorer because of her growing mohawk, but she follows buddies around all day so why won't she do it at dusk?

I've tried using those tiny rubber bands to hold her mohawk out of her eyes but she always snaps them off and I'm afraid to use a sturdier hair tye (like the ouchless elastics) because I don't want to accidentally pull the mohawk out (I've never had a Polish before so this is new to me).

 

[rosemarythyme]

Try trimming back the mohawk? It won't be as "pretty" but at this point you need her to be able to see, and it'll eventually grow back.

 

[3KillerBs]

Is she being bullied inside the coop?

How big is the coop, how many chickens do you have, and how much roost space is there?

Polish are often at the bottom of the pecking order and it's possible that the others aren't letting her roost.

 

[trinity2883]

Is she being bullied inside the coop?

How big is the coop, how many chickens do you have, and how much roost space is there?

Polish are often at the bottom of the pecking order and it's possible that the others aren't letting her roost.

I don't remember the dimensions but there's a fair amount of room in there for them. It's 8 pullets. She is definitely towards the bottom of the pecking order, but I haven't noted any over the top bullyish behavior towards her.

 

[rosemarythyme]

I don't remember the dimensions but there's a fair amount of room in there for them. It's 8 pullets. She is definitely towards the bottom of the pecking order, but I haven't noted any over the top bullyish behavior towards her.

They're pretty squished in that corner. How much space is beyond that inside the coop?

Are those beams they're sitting between the roosts? Might want to consider raising them so they'll use them, instead of sitting on the floor.

 

[trinity2883]

They're pretty squished in that corner. How much space is beyond that inside the coop?

Are those beams they're sitting between the roosts? Might want to consider raising them so they'll use them, instead of sitting on the floor.

Yeah that was their first dusk in the new (to them) coop outside and they all just kinda piled on each other for no reason. You're seeing about 1/4 of the inside coop area. I do plan to raise the roost bars up a bit, I'm not sure why they set so low (I bought a premade coop).

 

[3KillerBs]

What are the actual dimensions?

8 pullets ought to have 32 square feet in their coop -- 8x4 or 6x6 as the closest approximations.

 

[trinity2883]

Sorry for the delay in my response (IRL keeping me busy!) but I'm happy to report she has been going in on her own for about a week now! I guess she just needed a little longer to get it down than the others.

 

[MeeMawsChicks]

Hi, I am a newbie at raising chicks. 7 of them are 6 weeks old pullets ((2 Rhode Island Reds, 2 Barred Rocks, 2 Pearl White Leghorns and 1 Ameraucana). They all get along like sisters. They arrived in the mail from a hatchery together... Then, I have 3 chicks that are 5 weeks old. (1 Buff Brahma and 2 White Crested Black Polish pullets, which I got at Rural King. The 7 are already in the coop and loving it! My husband built a coop large enough for all of them, putting a chicken wire divider inside the coop to section off an “apartment” for the younger 3, which allows interaction between the two groups without the older girls able to pick on the two Polish chicks. They will also have a separate run at the back of the coop. I don’t worry about the Brahma because she will be big enough to take care of herself, but the two co-dependant Polish chicks “cry out” in panic when I take her out of the pen for a few minutes. We REALLY want to let them ALL to live in the coop together without the barrier but fear there will be problems.
I am now worried that the two Polish chicks (Lenny and Squiggy) will have a hard time adjusting to “coop life” and won’t know what to do or how to find their way around without Elvis their bodyguard/seeing-eye Brahma. How will I get the two Polish chicks, who refuse to be picked up, into the coop at “bedtime”?

 

[rosemarythyme]

Hi, I am a newbie at raising chicks. 7 of them are 6 weeks old pullets ((2 Rhode Island Reds, 2 Barred Rocks, 2 Pearl White Leghorns and 1 Ameraucana). They all get along like sisters. They arrived in the mail from a hatchery together... Then, I have 3 chicks that are 5 weeks old. (1 Buff Brahma and 2 White Crested Black Polish pullets, which I got at Rural King. The 7 are already in the coop and loving it! My husband built a coop large enough for all of them, putting a chicken wire divider inside the coop to section off an “apartment” for the younger 3, which allows interaction between the two groups without the older girls able to pick on the two Polish chicks. They will also have a separate run at the back of the coop. I don’t worry about the Brahma because she will be big enough to take care of herself, but the two co-dependant Polish chicks “cry out” in panic when I take her out of the pen for a few minutes. We REALLY want to let them ALL to live in the coop together without the barrier but fear there will be problems.
I am now worried that the two Polish chicks (Lenny and Squiggy) will have a hard time adjusting to “coop life” and won’t know what to do or how to find their way around without Elvis their bodyguard/seeing-eye Brahma. How will I get the two Polish chicks, who refuse to be picked up, into the coop at “bedtime”?

Why separate them at all? Take advantage of their relatively close ages and malleable pecking order and try putting them all together.

Now, if you already had tried that and the other chicks were picking on the Polish, that's a different issue. But it sounds like you went into this assuming there would be problems. I'd try treating them as 1 flock first before separating out the younger birds.