Strange behavoir

[Sconsalv]

Can someone explain this? My wife went out to shut the door on our chicken coop and noticed our 1 1/2 Yr old Red hen did go into the coop. very worried, we grabbed our flash lights and searched our heavily wooded property and found here sitting on a down tree , close to the coop . The whole flock commonly roost during the day when we let them out at this spot. She was very easy to pick up looked healthy and didn't seem scared. This behavior seemed odd. Now yesterday we let them out in the morning and around 5:30pm I heard the roosters making a distress noise which they seem to do this more when one of the flock members goes a stray. I looked up and sure enough our red was missing from the flock. She normally stays with the flock and is the more dominate of the hens. Normally when predator is around you can tell they frightened but time everything seemed normal. So we scoured the woods and couldn't find any signs of a struggle or feathers scattered anywhere . We tried again last night and this morning. Nothing ! They should be starting to molt soon so we didn't know if this was a behavior issue or what. I did hear that sometimes they will run off broader .My wife and I keep scratching our heads, where did she go? something just doesn't make sense.....any imput

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

They can make hidden nests, but if you found her roosting on a tree branch than she probably isn't broody. When they start to molt they can act sick or start to do odd behaviors because it's uncomfortable. She could also possibly be sick. If you don't see her in a day or so I would assume she died somewhere or something got her unfortunately.

 

[Mrs. K]

And, I would keep the rest of my flock in the run for a while. Once predator finds you, they will be back.

Mrs K

 

[Sconsalv]

Thanks for the reply. I had a good friend come and scorer the woods the next day and we found feathers on the other side of the property and after more searching and analyzing we come to the conclusion she had become a vicim to a predator. Sad part was that she was one of our first birds that started this love for chickens. After which i thought on the positive side and remembered we still had some of her eggs and i went out bought an incubator and started to incubate them . Hopefully they will hatch! I plan on keeping this post going through the whole experiance!

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

Sorry to hear that, but at least you know now, I will be I interested to see if you have any hatch, good luck.