Young(er) Ameracaunas Help

[Dirtymax9812]

Hello all!

This is my second batch of chickens, and this time, I have 20 Ameracauna Hens. These hens are approximately three and a half months old. and are VERY timid little creatures. I have them in a coop that I built myself. The coop is 8'x5'x4' with Roosting perches in the top. The coop sits on top of a 20'x5'x4' fenced in run. (It's painted now) it has 8 nesting boxes on the right side 4 across x 2 high.



Here's my Issues:

1) How in the world can I make these things not so timid? I can as much as walk past them and they all run the opposite direction as if I was going to kill them. They will pile up in a corner and continuously jump on each other.

2) They have picked the grass in the fenced in run clean, and it is all dirt now. I would like to free range them, but I have some concerns on that...
a) Will the be smart enough to come back into the coop at night? I dont want them all over in the trees, the neighbors bushes, etc.
b) If a stray cat, or dog were to come after them, would they be smart enough to come back to the coop, or "go up" to get away from them?


They all are heading into the roosts now about an hour before it gets dark, and are out every morning before i get up at 5:30am

They have the whole "coop is for sleep, and run is for food/water" thing down.

I just want to know that IF i do let them free range that 1) they will come back to the coop at night, and 2) that they will not wander into the neighbors garage, or ours, or across the street in front of the house, etc...

Any and ALL advice/help is welcome

 

[lazy gardener]

Yes, they will return to the coop at night. And they will be smart enough to do their best to evade predators. However, Your pic shows an other house close by, and I don't see much around the yard for natural cover. They will be vulnerable to aerial attack as well as ground predators. Your chickens won't respect property lines, and with there being 20 of them, they'll forage farther than they would if there were just a few of them. The dimensions of your coop and existing run, are a minimum size to house 10 - 12 chickens at the most. I'm guessing you have some pretty cold snowy weather in the winter? Even with the run covered so they can use it all winter, they'll be more prone to develop aggressive behaviors when shut up in a winter coop/run. I only had 5 birds in a 4 x 8 loft with a 8 x 12 run under it, which was attached to a 15 x 30' run, part of which was a green house. One of my EE girls, even with all of that space got bored, and started plucking the muffs off her sisters. This has become an ingrained habit with her, and she will have to be culled when I butcher the roosters.

Re: timidity: Araucanas are by nature timid birds. Continue to offer them treats. They will be less timid as they approach laying age. Part of their timidity may be associated with them being in a small enclosure. They may feel more vulnerable than they would if they had a larger space and areas to get away from perceived threats.

 

[aart]

You said ALL advise is welcome...so I am going to be bluntly honest.... I'm not trying to be mean, just realistic.

If that coop is 8x5, your run looks to be 16x5, but regardless.....

That space is way too small for 20 birds, especially in winter...think of all the snow we got last year, my birds spent many a day inside the coop... even when I shoveled out part of the run.

Free ranging them will probably make your neighbors very unhappy, as you already know chickens can quickly and thoroughly decimate any and all vegetation they have access to......and then there's the poop. The birds would definitely be susceptible to predators both wild and domestic. Domestic dogs are probably the number one predator risk in a lot of places.

Keeping chickens can be easy....IF you give them plenty of coop/run space and make those spaces easy for the keeper to access to care for them...or it can be a nightmare of unhappy, crowded chickens and frustrated keepers.

I would suggest that you reduce your bird population by half, take out half the nests to make space for food and water in the winter, attach a larger walk-in run and plan now how you will access the coop/run during the winter.

If you have a larger walk-in run, you can go out there and sit quietly in the run on an overturned bucket with some tasty chicken treats...with calm, slow movements and patience eventually the birds will come to be less nervous around you.

There's a couple of links to articles on Space and Ventilation that are full of excellent information to help lessen your learning curve and make your chicken keeping experience more pleasant. Best of Luck to you!

 

[bobbi-j]

You said ALL advise is welcome...so I am going to be bluntly honest.... I'm not trying to be mean, just realistic.

If that coop is 8x5, your run looks to be 16x5, but regardless.....

That space is way too small for 20 birds, especially in winter...think of all the snow we got last year, my birds spent many a day inside the coop... even when I shoveled out part of the run.

Free ranging them will probably make your neighbors very unhappy, as you already know chickens can quickly and thoroughly decimate any and all vegetation they have access to......and then there's the poop. The birds would definitely be susceptible to predators both wild and domestic. Domestic dogs are probably the number one predator risk in a lot of places.

Keeping chickens can be easy....IF you give them plenty of coop/run space and make those spaces easy for the keeper to access to care for them...or it can be a nightmare of unhappy, crowded chickens and frustrated keepers.

I would suggest that you reduce your bird population by half, take out half the nests to make space for food and water in the winter, attach a larger walk-in run and plan now how you will access the coop/run during the winter.

If you have a larger walk-in run, you can go out there and sit quietly in the run on an overturned bucket with some tasty chicken treats...with calm, slow movements and patience eventually the birds will come to be less nervous around you.

There's a couple of links to articles on Space and Ventilation that are full of excellent information to help lessen your learning curve and make your chicken keeping experience more pleasant. Best of Luck to you!

This.

 

[Dirtymax9812]

I appreciate all the comments, however, I do believe that I have plenty of room for 20 birds. The run is over 20 feet long, by 5 food wide, by 3-4 feet tall. They have plenty of space. The neighbor in the picture is absolutely fine with my birds wandering in his lawn, I simply do not want them thinking that they can go into the garage that he never shuts.

I have about an acre of land, and my coop is directly behind my garage, as you can see. They can roam the entire back yard, which is where the majority of the property is.

I just want to know for sure that if i do let them out, that they will return at night. I dont want to find them on the roof of my house, in the pines in the back of the house, or anywhere else but their coop.

My last birds I had, I didn't have them throughout the winter, and I dont plan to have these throughout the winter either. I get them in the spring, collect eggs until about late November, then i sell the birds to a local farmer who adds them to their flock.

I sell them because I work long hours, and when I get home to collect eggs, in the winter they're frozen, and cracked. May as well let somebody else enjoy the eggs, since I cant.

 

[Ridgerunner]

They are living animals. Those don’t come with absolute guarantees. However, chickens really do want to return to the coop at night and sleep where they are used to sleeping. They will want to return there at night to sleep. You can let them out and they will want to go back to that coop to sleep, that’s about as sure a thing as you can get with chickens’ behavior.

What you might see the first night is that they want to go back in there but they get trapped outside. They don’t always pick up on the concept of “gate” real well. I’ve had chickens get on the back side of the run away from the gate, trying desperately to find a way through the fence to get to the roosts, but totally forget about that gate they had been going in and out of all day. So the first couple of nights, you may need to herd them around to the gate at bedtime. Normally you only have to do that once or twice and they figure it out and it’s usually only one or two, not the whole flock.

Something else that can happen. Chickens can be fairly brutal to each other on the roosts as they are settling down to sleep. Yours are still young enough that they are sorting out the pecking order as they mature. They mature at different rates and they adjust the pecking order as they all reach maturity. Often it’s not a big problem but it is possible you can have a brute get petty brutal on the roosts. The weaker chickens might look for a safer place to sleep than on the roosts. I’ve had that happen several times, always when there are younger chickens with the flock. They almost always find a safer place to sleep inside the coop (which might be your nests) but I have had some completely leave the coop and sleep outside. I put up a separate roost, lower than the main roosts and separated horizontally to give those chickens a safe place to go that is not my nests. You probably won’t see that and if you do they will almost surely want to be around the coop, but it is possible they could look for a tree. That is a really low possibility but it exists.

When it is hot those chicken will look for a place that is covered to protect them from airborne predators and out of the sun. Your neighbor’s garage sounds like the perfect place for them to go. I’d be surprised if they did not make that their hangout. They will probably fill up their crops and go in there to digest it and poop all over everything. They do not respect boundaries or other people’s property.

As big as yours are getting a cat isn’t much of a threat but a dog could do serious damage. They are just not that good at getting away from predators. Dogs will just play with them, catch them and kill them, then go grab another fluffy squeaky toy. It’s normal for a dog to kill a lot at one time, not to eat but just to play. You are at risk of other predators too but dogs are probably your biggest threat. You may be able to let them free range with absolutely no predator problems for a real long time or you could take serious damage the first time you try. That’s another thing that doesn’t come with guarantees.

To socialize your chicks, take a chair out there and read a book. Take some treats too and scatter them around. Always use the same bucket for treats, get them used to the idea that the bucket is a good thing. Initially they will be scared or you, the chair, the book, and the bucket. But just sit there. Don’t pay any attention to them at all. After maybe 15 minutes to half an hour, leave. Then do that again later in the day or the next day. Don’t forget the treats each time. Eventually they will get used to you, the chair, the book, and the bucket. It requires patience and a time investment.

Have you followed that link in Aart’s signature about room? It’s the same article linked in my signature. I wrote it. It’s easy to think you have plenty of room now when they are still babies and small and the weather is great, but I think you really should read it. You may have enough space, that’s another thing that doesn’t come with guarantees, but if you read that article you will have a better idea of what behavioirs you should be looking for, what might be causing a problem, and maybe some help dealing with it.

Good luck!

 

[Mrs. K]

Yes, they will come back to the coop and yes they will go in your neighbors garage. Yes, local dogs and other predators will kill them, so you won't have as many coming back.

No - you don't have enough space for that number of full grown birds.


Mrs K

 

[Dirtymax9812]

UPDATE - as of Sunday, 7-27, I sold 10 hens. I only have 10 now. Is space still a concern?

 

[Mrs. K]

Well, wait and see how they get on.

Personally, just hazing at the picture, I would think between 5-8 full size hens, 8-12 bantams.

Mrs K

 

[Dirtymax9812]

This past weekend I've moved all the hens into a 10' x 20' x 6' tall Dog kennel that was given to me. I have a tarp covering it, so they cant get out, and no airborn attackers can get in. I've got this set up as kind of a mobile run. Right now, its in a section of my garden. I get free rototilling from them, and they can pick and dig all they please.