#im having so much fun though. enrichment in my enclosure or whatever

[elftwink]

am currently working on a neocities site (which i cannot give you the url for yet because im working on the css still and there's no content also it looks ugly still) and oh man does it take me back to ye olde days of custom theme editing on here. i still use a custom theme obvs but back in like 2014/2015ish when i was really into indie rp custom themes were all the rage and you would spend hours editing some character specific image for your bg and then another several hours trying to make the css line up with your image (never at any point did i attempt to actually like. learn html or css. i just read other people's theme codes and edited the parts i could understand and solved problems as they arose. i distinctly remember one time i was using a base that had two sidebars and i only wanted one and deleting the section broke the theme in disastrous ways [bc i had no idea what i was doing] so i literally just made all the elements in the sidebar transparent and moved them off the screen LMAO. the best i ever got was moving from fully built custom themes that i edited to base themes that i built off of)

anyway while im slightly better now (im even reading tutorials! am i following them? sorry i have to go i think someones calling me) i am using a layout builder to build the homepage so it is even more reminding me of mid-2010s tumblr. much like building off a base theme, and definitely easier to understand than tumblr theme building (this time i at least know what all the different pieces of code are doing, even when im not sure how or why, or how to duplicate the effect under slightly different circumstances. but progress is progress!).

a good but annoying thing about the layout that im using is that i havent actually edited the site wide stylesheet, just used internal css on that one page, so when i go to make literally any other page i'll have to start from scratch. this is good because i am learning a lot and i think without doing it this way i would end up with a bunch of useless stuff in the stylesheet that really should be page-specific that i would have to correct with internal or inline css later. annoying because what do you mean i have to make decisions about the sizing and positions of the content? i literally just did that

also im kind of nervous to touch the general stylesheet because im pretty sure what i'll actually want to do is have a couple of stylesheets for different 'sections' of the website, to maintain cohesion between pages of the 'same' type but still allow a lot of fun customization on a per-page basis, but that requires deciding what 'sections' i want on the website and that is a whole other can of worms. but also you can't start without starting so i should probably just try to build a really simple layout and go from there (after all, if it sucks, it's not like i can't just create a new stylesheet, or do the css for each page independently until i hit a groove that's actually worth moving to the stylesheet). but also first i have to finish this goddamn homepage. which means i gotta find a header image that doesn't look ugly as shit

[raptorsandpoultry]

Hii, I have four chickens and your posts about hens have been useful for me. Right now I'm worried with two of my chickens because one keep pecking the other when they go search for food. Also she now is very scared of me and the others too, she often stay alone and far away. Also I noticed she eat less and she is smaller than the others. Her feathers and eggs are always is a bad state :c I worry about her a lot but Im not sure what to do, I tried separating her a few times in the day

Hi anon, I’m so sorry to hear about your poor little hen.

Unfortunately it wouldn’t be responsible of me to give you too much advice without knowing more details about the situation. How big is their coop/enclosure? Do they free-range? What’s a normal day like (for all four of them)? Please don’t be afraid to DM me, I’m happy to try and help!

For starters though, feather-pecking (abnormal behaviour in which more dominant chickens peck at the feathers and/or skin of their less dominant flockmates) is a very multifaceted anomaly - similar to human psychiatric disorders such as Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, there are many genetic and environmental factors at its root. Chicken behaviour and welfare scientists who have been studying this behaviour for decades still aren’t 100% sure why and how exactly it develops. My honours undergraduate thesis project was on feather-pecking, and despite the months of work that I put in, I probably didn’t even scratch the surface of just one of the contributing factors (I have been meaning to write a post about it)!

What the research community seems to agree upon so far though is that feather-pecking is 1) a learned behaviour, 2) in part, re-directed foraging behaviour, and 3) can be triggered or exacerbated by crowding or a lack of space.

So, without being there in person to see your chicken’s living conditions and how they all interact with each other, I can give you some very general solutions. Since feather-pecking is a learned behaviour that might be a result of a lack of foraging opportunities, this means that chickens can learn to re-direct this behaviour away from their “victims”, as long as you set up their environment for this. Generally in animal training, the best way to “get rid of” an undesirable behaviour is to replace it with something else through training, or re-direct it onto another stimulus, which is usually enrichment. Enrichment is anything that encourages natural behaviour (such as pecking while foraging for food) in a healthy manner. This can include toys, a pile of leaves, food items like lettuce heads to keep the chickens stimulated and occupied...The list is endless, but what this will do is provide an opportunity to re-direct your chickens’ pecking behaviour away from their victim to their toys, food, etc. People often think it’s enough to just let their chickens out to peck around in the grass all day - it’s not. They will get bored, just like any other animal, and thus they need a variety of ways to keep themselves busy and just have fun. Lastly, if #3 applies to you, then you can do whatever you can to give your chickens more space, especially places (nest boxes, high perches, etc.) that each one can retreat to and hide in when they need to get away or have some private time to themselves.

I’ve written about enrichment a few times before, so hopefully these can give you some ideas: https://raptorsandpoultry.tumblr.com/post/182984461607/what-are-some-good-chicken-enrichment-items

https://raptorsandpoultry.tumblr.com/post/182964422255/for-todays-bonus-round-of-enrichment-ft-birds

https://raptorsandpoultry.tumblr.com/post/182895619761/manipulative-toys-are-a-type-of-enrichment-that-is

Last but not least, training is a form of enrichment too! This will definitely give your chickens some extra mental stimulation that might tone down their motivation to feather-peck, and if you focus on the little one who’s getting bullied, it will also help build her confidence and strengthen her trust in you: https://raptorsandpoultry.tumblr.com/post/175377508102/for-those-of-you-who-dont-know-i-have-been

I hope this helps. Again, please feel free to message me if you want to discuss more in detail. It’s clear that you care about each of your chickens very much, and the fact that you’re looking for advice to make things better for them is a huge step in the right direction!

Sources:

Blokhuis HJ. Feather-pecking in poultry: its relation with ground-pecking. Applied Animal Behaviour Science. 1986 Aug 1;16(1):63-7.

Hughes BO, Duncan IJ. The influence of strain and environmental factors upon feather pecking and cannibalism in fowls. British poultry science. 1972 Nov 1;13(6):525-47.

Kjaer JB, Sørensen P. Feather pecking behaviour in White Leghorns, a genetic study. British Poultry Science. 1997 Sep 1;38(4):333-41.