The Mean Girls.

[Jmurph]

I have been raising chickens for the past 5 years or so, and up till this past year I have had no issues. (other than a raccoon attack...no more raccoon, or his brother, or his possum friend.).

I currently have a flock of 8 chickens. Last fall, the MEAN girls started picking on "Fancy Pants" (cochin) and Sophie (Polish). I removed the injured. (mean girls drew blood from Fancy and peck out feathers from Sophie). They recooperated in the garage. I put them back out in the coop after about 6 weeks in the garage..Realized there was ONE offending chicken (Peanut)...put them back in the garage, since they had blood AGAIN.
Peanut is now gone. Put Sophie and Fancy back out and the SAME thing is happening.Fancy gets "kicked OUT" of the nest box by the others and they literally chase her around and peck on her. I now have baby chicks in the garage in a large pen with Fancy and all is well with them. I went outside this morning AND Sophie has 1/2 of her head feathers pecked out.AGAIN! .I put blue kote AND Pine tar on her head and she was growing everything back in nicely. Even put her feathers up in a rubber band...band is gone as are most of her head feathers. I have another Polish hen and all is well with her. I have NO roosters.

While I think the idea of a "house" chicken is cute, I don't think it is practical. I understand there is a pecking order, but I am not about to stand by and let a chicken get pecked to death. Maybe I should rehome all of the MEAN girls when the baby chicks get older? (They are not mean to people, just to their coop mates). I am not understanding this since they are over a year old and have all been raised together.

Anyone have any thoughts? In case it matters, The Mean Girl Posse consists of a Speckled Sussex (I think head BE---ACHHH), Lavender Orpington, Rhode Island Red and another Cochin. There is another Polish and a Frizzle that are not part of the "clique".

 

[CMV]

It's really unfortunate when you have a group of bullies. The pecking order in action can be a hard thing to have to witness.

I had a similar situation once where I had a group of feather pickers that were just destroying my flock. I tried everything I could to curtail the behavior for about a year until I finally decided that what I was doing was simply not working. I eventually started culling out birds I saw acting destructively. I tried trial separations, but that did not stop the behaviors, merely gave the victims some peace from the bullies for a while until the birds were eventually reintroduced. Once the bullies came back, the behaviors resumed within a week. I started permanently culling the re-offenders. I had to remove all but one member of the "mean girls" clique. The lowest member within the group was able to be rehabilitated. The behaviors stopped. All the bullied girls became the new flock masters, and they were much kinder towards their underlings, by far. And I have never had to deal with any awful cliques like this again. I still do not know why this group acted the way it did. I have had groups of birds before and since, but never a group as nasty as that particular batch. I always blamed it on their breed (RIRs mostly), but who knows?

 

[Jmurph]

Thank you so much for your reply. After a discussion with my husband, we have decided that there is no way we are going to let some domineering mean girl rule the back 40.
This is the plan:
Fancy is already in with the two week old chicks in a large enclosure in the garage. She has a perch and a nesting box. It has been four days and all are "happy, happy". I am going to put Sophie in there tomorrow. I would do it tonight, but I am not able to supervise the transition and since it is in the garage, it has a few heat lamps and thus is not really "night". I will wait a few weeks and put the Frizzle in and then the other Polish. The clique can then all go together to Camp Kenmore when the babies are ready to acclimate to the outside coop.
I think I just needed to talk it out as I am beside myself. These MEAN GIRLS seriously come running after the friendly ones...almost if they are attacking them. NO...They are ATTACKING them. They PHYSICALLY kicked Fancy out of the nest box. I put a nice layer of pine tar on Sophies head...It is all GONE...Geez...they have food. Can they hate one sooo much that they will eat Pine tar? AND the feathers that are left are blue...(didn't want to leave even a TRACE of blood for them to see)...Looks like she is a punk rocker going through chemo. (pls don't take offense, my mom was recently diagnosed with a Stage III Cancer, so I know what it is like).

 

[CMV]

Camp Kenmore...that cracked me up. Sounds like a solid plan.

I know your frustration. A couple of my mean girls would just pin their victim to the ground and start grazing on her while she was completely helpless. It was awful to watch. I watched it too many times and when they kept doing it to my favorite hen (she was plucked nearly bald all over her body)...that was it! I started culling them out. Small groups at a time. I would witness some bullying behavior and blast the culprits with bright pink spray paint to mark them. Next weekend that rolled around, any birds with pink blazes got the ax. It seemed wasteful to cull birds that were in their prime reproductive/productive years, but I had tried everything else. And they didn't go to waste. The family enjoyed plenty of chicken dinners.

I am sorry to hear about your Mom. I am sending healing thoughts in her direction.

Good luck.