Problem with hens.....

[emberiza]

We raised 12 hens (cross between Rhode Island Red and Leghorn) in a place where the roof was so low that they couldn't fly. We moved our chicks to a big chicken coup when they were almost 4 months old. We have nice perches and nests for them but they don't want to fly....They want to be on the floor of the chicken coup and they also lay their eggs there. Any advice how we could change this habit so that they would lay their eggs in nests?

Also we recently got a rooster for the hens, but it doesn't seem to be working out...The hens are not interested in the rooster (except for pecking him at times)....They are quite attached to us and ran to us as they see us and stoop down......

Any advice, can we change their behaviour, they're now about 5 months old....

 

[LynneP]

One day, one hen will fly and then the others will learn it's safe- The sky is NOT falling. Takes a lot of time. I put a suet/seed feeder in the coop this winter and it took weeks for one bird to use it, then three more and now all of them. They resist change like no other species...and nest boxes about 1 foot off the ground with a perch at the one foot level outside them should correct the egg-laying location...

or you could demonstrate for them...

 

[scooter147]

Without a momma to show them that roosting is a natural thing they need to adopt into their daily lives it takes them a while to pick it up or for that instinct to kick in.
Honestly, in my 40+ years of raising chickens I have never had a chicken that did not eventually roost. (never owned a silkie, but I think that is more because they don't have "real" wing feathers and it is hard for them to navigate the up and down of roosts).

Place some fake eggs or golf balls in the nest boxes, this usually lures them in.

They view you as their provider and protector, thus the reason they come running and then submit to you in the mating position, they veiw you as the alph rooster. This behavior is not breakable as far as I know.

 

[Wynette]

Place wooden eggs in the nest boxes...they'll soon learn. Give them time.

 

[WoodlandWoman]

How high are the nest boxes? How high are the roosts?