[atwickwitch]

hello, advice please.
one of my cuckoo moran lady (lulu) aged 2 wont come off the nest.
i bought two speckled sussex GIRLS in august when they were little babies. one of them was not a girl but i didnt know this until last week.dumb yes i know but they were sold to me as little girls.
the clue was he was jumping on top of every hen he possibly could pin down. lulu was one of the unlucky (or lucky im not sure) ones to get ravaged by him last week.its not even spring!!
since then she wont budge. shes been in there 6 days now, she doesnt poo in the nest and she hasnt laid an egg and isnt bothered about sitting on any of the other hens eggs so i didnt know if she was ill or broody. i thought if she was broody she would of been sitting on an egg whether it be hers or anyone elses but shes not. i have picked her up a few times and taken her outside but for some reason all the other chickens go for her. this hasnt happened before as they are a friendly lot usually.
she just picks her legs up and runs back into the shed and sits in her bed.
i dont understand why the others have turned against her and cant work out why she refuses to come out. although to be fair if i had 12 other girls attacking me and a male jumping on top of me i wouldnt come out of bed either.
she is eating, i am taking her milk, egg and cheese all  warmed up together which she gobbles down.
any help or suggestions please. i would be extremely grateful as i dont like my chickens being upset.. many thanks atwickwitch

[joyfull]

does she fluff herself up when you go to lift her out of the nest box, does she try and peck at you or even growl at you? If the answer is yes to any of those questions then yes she is broody and the others will pick on her as they see it is her duty to hatch all of their eggs - not all hens go broody but they all want the broody to hatch theirs.

[atwickwitch]

hi joyfull, thankyou for your reply. nope she doesnt make much of a sound when i pick her up and she doesnt try to peck me either. i have 3 nest boxes and she is sitting in the one that there are no eggs in. she isnt interested in the boxes that have the eggs in which are in clear sight of her.
i have picked her up and taken her outside a few times today but she just goes back into her bed.
if i keep taking her outside will she eventually give up and will the others stop rounding on her . many thanks.. atwickwitch

[joyfull]

when you place her down on the ground does she either just sit there or does she race around eating and rosey to herself? Does she have big smelly poohs?

[atwickwitch]

when i put her down she just runs away as fast as she can to get away from the other chickens.pooh wise i have only seen two of them and that was today and they were quite small but a good colour and shape.  thankyou atwickwitch

[PaulineM]

Hi
Lift her up and check her breast, if she is broody she will most likely have plucked her breast bare.
If she has decided that that nest box is her nest, she will run back to it whether or not there is an egg there or not, at least that is what one of my hens does.

[ANHBUC]

hello, advice please.
one of my cuckoo moran lady (lulu) aged 2 wont come off the nest.
i bought two speckled sussex GIRLS in august when they were little babies. one of them was not a girl but i didnt know this until last week.dumb yes i know but they were sold to me as little girls.
the clue was he was jumping on top of every hen he possibly could pin down. lulu was one of the unlucky (or lucky im not sure) ones to get ravaged by him last week.its not even spring!!
since then she wont budge. shes been in there 6 days now, she doesnt poo in the nest and she hasnt laid an egg and isnt bothered about sitting on any of the other hens eggs so i didnt know if she was ill or broody. i thought if she was broody she would of been sitting on an egg whether it be hers or anyone elses but shes not. i have picked her up a few times and taken her outside but for some reason all the other chickens go for her. this hasnt happened before as they are a friendly lot usually.
she just picks her legs up and runs back into the shed and sits in her bed.
i dont understand why the others have turned against her and cant work out why she refuses to come out. although to be fair if i had 12 other girls attacking me and a male jumping on top of me i wouldnt come out of bed either.
she is eating, i am taking her milk, egg and cheese all  warmed up together which she gobbles down.
any help or suggestions please. i would be extremely grateful as i dont like my chickens being upset.. many thanks atwickwitch

Be careful what you are feeding her as what you have given her should be a little treat and not her food.

She may not growl and peck at you if she has no eggs.  Try putting some eggs under her for a day or so and see if her temperament changes.  She may not pluck her brest until she has a full clutch of eggs and is ready to start incubating them.   

[joyfull]

a couple of mine who are serial broodies growl and peck even when sitting on fresh air 

[ANHBUC]

a couple of mine who are serial broodies growl and peck even when sitting on fresh air 

Psycho hens!!   

[Sandringham]

I am new to keeping chickens myself but I have 3 Pekin bantums, 2 buff (Nettle & Clover) and 1 Lavender (Lavender... I know but it suites her).

From what I was told they were all hatched in March so should be around the same age. However Nettle & Clover haven,t even started to lay yet while Lavender started laying at the beginning of June and stopped in early November however as soon as she stopped laying she started to head off back to her nest box leaving the other 2 roaming around the garden. She hunkers down and looks all grumpy and just sits there all day, luckily for her she is the top chick so the others let her get on with it, no fighting or anything.

A friend who knows more than me about chickens suggested I keep disturbing her so maybe you could do the same but rig up a bit of garden separate for her so she feels safe outside as the bullying is only going to make sitting in the nest box even more attractive.

since then she is also refusing to leave her nest box. The and two haven,t even started laying yet. The other one started in June and stopped about  3 weeks ago

[Sandringham]

Sorry ignore the garbled last paragraph, I am using an iPad and couldn't, see it was still there when I pressed the post button.

[atwickwitch]

hi sandringham
thanks for your reply
i think she may of been having a bad week. i put a few fake eggs in the nest with her as was suggested by another person, she screamed at them 9the same scream they make when a sparrow hawk is flying around) she left the box and went and hid under the hedge in the garden for the rest of the day.
i was given her and two others a while back and when they came to me they all had the most awful scaley leg which i treated but it has left her legs quite badly deformed. i have noticed that since she has been back out in the garden she is only standing on one leg at a time so i think her feet are hurting her. she has always stayed off her feet as much as possible because of her sore feet. they arent cut underneath, i gave them a good check yesterday so i dont know how to make her feet any more comfortable for her and i feel quite sad for her that i cant stop her feet hurting..
thanks for your help  and suggestions            atwickwitch 

[joyfull]

take her to a vet to see if she has bumble foot or something stuck in her foot.

[ANHBUC]

Mine tend to stand on one foot or the other especially when it is cold.  I let them all out of the walk in run today and they had a brief look around in the snow then headed back.  They obviously prefer the comfort that the roof is providing them.   

[Sandringham]

It's horrible when something you love isn't well. Could her claws be too long and need cutting? Also the problem my be of a psychological nature? as you say she didn't come to you in the best of health so may have had a bad time of it in other ways. She does seem over anxious to me but I don't know whether there is anything you can use to treat excessive anxiety in Chickens. 

I hope things improve for you both.