[Cass]

Hello everyone.  We picked up our chickens today hooray and hoorah.  They are great and we have fallen in love with them already, we keep going outside and just looking at them!  They must think we're wierd! ive just been outside for another 'look' and 'Daisy' is doing a sort of half sneeze/half cluck noise???  Is this normal?? Also, 'Buttercup' is just sat at the bottom of the ladder, head tucked under wing asleep - are we to help her up into bed later when it gets dark???

[Vember]

They might go in

I normally leave any new birds in the coop for a bit before letting them loose so to speak and they seem to find their way back at bedtime
If you put them straight in the run then I think you will probably have to help them in

It will have been a very strange day for them so it'll take them a day or too to settle so I shouldn't worry too much about them sleeping and stuff

Sarah

[janeheritage]

If she is fast asleep, she won't mind a bit if you pick her up and pop her in her house.

Mine learned where to go in 3 days but needed a bit of help until then. 

[Cass]

Thanks.  We did need to help them up into bed (much hilarity and sniggering - glad children were in bed and didnt hear the swearing!!)  We popped back out half an hour later to check that they weren't sleeping in the nesting box and all three of they were inbetween the perches!!!  Argh!!

[Tazzy]

I normally check on any new ones after dusk to make sure they are on perches, not in the nest boxes as the aggs get covered in poo! Just pop them onto a perch if they are in a box, they're normally easier to handle when the light is going.

tazzy

[janeheritage]

Ours preferref the nest boxes for weeks but finally got the perches sorted. Then one of them went broody 

[Cass]

Thanks again.  we popped out again before we went to bed and the one had gone back into the nesting box, we figured we would just let them be for the first night and will persevere with getting them on the perches when they have settled in??? or am I making a very large rod for my back??

[andreadon]

if she wants to sleep in the nest box, then she will! 

you have to keep taking her out and popping her on the perch.
she'll get the hang of it!
 

[janeheritage]

Our White Sussex hybrid, Ethel, was the worst. Tucked up cosy in the nest box for weeks, had to be shifted every night.

Obviously practising for getting broody 

[nicchick]

I let Fanny (ex-batt) sleep in the nest box - she just looks so cosy and I figure she's earned it! The top hen goes between the perches (?) and all the others perch. When Valentine (very bald and thin ex-batt) started to perch I had a little sniffle down by the compost heap.
I have to pick up the poo wherever it is so I don't get to worried where they all sleep. Nic.