WANTED: Your chicken calls!!!

[wordgirl]

I'm not quite sure where's the best place to post this....

We're getting our first batch of chicks in about a week, and I'm trying to decide how to call them for feeding time (when they're older, and free-range). Please tell me they do respond to calls!

If you have a chicken call that you use to round up your chickies at dinnertime, I'd love to hear it! Does anyone use a bell or a dinner triangle???

Thanks!

 

[Cats Critters]

Here is a thread on chicken calls: https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=159810
Mine is "Here chicky chicky, here chicky chicky..."

 

[warmfuzzies]

CHIIIIIIIIIICK-CHICK-CHICK-CHICK-CHICK!!!

Or sometimes, I just say 'here, girls!' and they come running. My DH thinks it is great, and everytime he has friends over, he tells me to call them, so they can see them running. He tries and tries to call them, but they just look at him.

One thing you should try to do, is ALWAYS have something nice for them when you call them. Their dinner, or just a treat. If you call them every night to pen them up, and never reward them, they will quickly be trained NOT to come.

 

[joebryant]

I'm sorry, but I keep mine secret because it's so good that I expect to win county fair, state fair, and national championships with it. Stayed tuned to the NEWS stations. Of course it, like everything else, is for sale (offers will be considered) if you want all the fame, fortune, accolades, and adoration of every woman in the country.

 

[wordgirl]

Quote:
Thank you!!! That will give us lots of ideas!

 

[melissastraka]

I dont call mine, i know better or I have 100+ chickens at my feet! they always think i have something for them....because i usually do and they can hear it drop a mile away and come running for it!

 

[redhen]

i just say.."come on girls! Chick, Chick" in a high pitched voice..they always come running.. even if i'm in the house and i yell out the window at them they come running to me...i love it!

*of course, i'm beginning to suspect its the food they love and not me!..*

 

[Ladyhawke1]

Good Grief! A hundred Chickens!

Anyone with 100 birds would have to be really careful when calling chickens to come. Remember they are dinosaurs ... only with feathers.

God forbid if there were any accidents, there wouldn’t be anything left for anyone to identify.

Here in town I have decided to keep my “poultry” operation secret.

I have instructed everyone that when they come over to see the animals they must never use the “C” word aloud in case the neighbors are listening. They are BIRDS. Ground dwelling Asian parrots comes to mind.

As I understand it, I may have five poultry here. However, just to be safe I just call ….”hereeee birdie, birdie, birdie”.

 

[Sunny Side Up]

Mama hens call their chicks & roosters call their hens with the same type of sound, a rather high-pitched buk-buk-buk-buk! So I think our human calls of "Heeeere chick-chick-chick" or variations on that sort of sound like the summons they're used to hearing from their moms/husbands.

If you give them treats they'll learn to associate the accompanying sound with the reward & come running to that. The slam of a screen door or the click of a gate latch or the stomp of your boots. I give mine cracked corn and they will come running when they hear me shake the corn in the metal coffee can. It's really handy to have them thus trained, to be able to summon them when I need them in a certain place.

But you shouldn't have to call them to come roost in the coop at night, most chickens will put themselves to bed in the right place. And you don't have to give them treats every time you call them, in fact, it makes them more likely to respond if they aren't certain when the payoff will occur. Sort of like gambling, the random rewards are more addicting.

Edited to add

Wordgirl!

 

[silkieluver_07]

For chicks I "cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck" in a low voice. I even due this when the eggs are still in the bator. (Crazy I know

)

My silkies come to "Peppi!!!!!!!!!! Peppi Peppi Peppi!!!!!!" (That's my partridge silkie hen's name. All the others now know that food is on its way so they come running.)

For the laying hens its "Here chick, chick, chick.....CHIIIICCCCKKKK!"