First, a little background...My main flock of 12 have been together since peeps, and are now a little over a year old. In May, I added 3 day old girls. The babies have been housed in the coop since they were a month old in a hardware cloth divided area of about 2'x5' in dimension.
About a week or so ago, I noticed one of my Wyandottes limping. I discovered she had somehow losted a toenail from one of her feet! It has healed well, but 3 days ago while she was free ranging I wen to pet her and she did not do her usual squat. Once my hand approached her face, she panicked and moved away from the hand...and ran into my leg. This happened twice, when I then "tested" her and determined she could not see out of her right eye (same side as the injured toe). There is no sign of injury to her eye (pecking, etc) and it is not blue or "cataract" looking. She still got around okay eating grass, etc, and made it back fine to the coop, although her position with her right side against the outside wall of the coop while on the roost makes more sense now. The next morning I discovered her comb had been picked on through the night and some dried blood was on it. I monitered the flock off/on during the day and found my BO attacking her in the run. I broke up the attack, only to have the BO go after her again within 5 minutes of the first attack.
My coop 8x8...enough room for all the girls when able to move about, but not enough to keep the mini-coop for the babies as well as a "jail" section for the BO...I've had to move my 2 Wellsummers and 1 EE out with the "big" girls (They're 14 weeks old...have been doing great with the older ones - yeah!) and I put my dominate BO in the mini-coop as a jail/time out. How long should she be kept away from the others? It's been 2 days now...is a week the average time to re-align the heirarchy? More time-less time? The remaining flock has been doing well, and my poor 1/2 blind, 3 toed hen has been doing well with no new injuries.
About a week or so ago, I noticed one of my Wyandottes limping. I discovered she had somehow losted a toenail from one of her feet! It has healed well, but 3 days ago while she was free ranging I wen to pet her and she did not do her usual squat. Once my hand approached her face, she panicked and moved away from the hand...and ran into my leg. This happened twice, when I then "tested" her and determined she could not see out of her right eye (same side as the injured toe). There is no sign of injury to her eye (pecking, etc) and it is not blue or "cataract" looking. She still got around okay eating grass, etc, and made it back fine to the coop, although her position with her right side against the outside wall of the coop while on the roost makes more sense now. The next morning I discovered her comb had been picked on through the night and some dried blood was on it. I monitered the flock off/on during the day and found my BO attacking her in the run. I broke up the attack, only to have the BO go after her again within 5 minutes of the first attack.
My coop 8x8...enough room for all the girls when able to move about, but not enough to keep the mini-coop for the babies as well as a "jail" section for the BO...I've had to move my 2 Wellsummers and 1 EE out with the "big" girls (They're 14 weeks old...have been doing great with the older ones - yeah!) and I put my dominate BO in the mini-coop as a jail/time out. How long should she be kept away from the others? It's been 2 days now...is a week the average time to re-align the heirarchy? More time-less time? The remaining flock has been doing well, and my poor 1/2 blind, 3 toed hen has been doing well with no new injuries.
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