Storms and chickens

[ChicagoEglu]

Hello. A brand new Eglu Cube here. We got our 4 - 2 month old chickens today. We released them in the cube when they first arrived, but they flew down through the door right off . In the evening they just lay down in the run and would not go inside the cube. I decided to catch one and put her in the cube, but she escaped anyway. How do I encourage them to sleep in the cube?

 

[Makenna]

Hi there,

I'm a new chicken mom living in south Texas, and I had a similar issue.  I recently adopted three older Rhode Island Reds.  I created a really s*****y, large, predator-proof run for the hens, (we have a LOT of predators here so they will never be able to free-range, which I'm fine with.)  October was nice and warm for us, so none of my three hens wanted to sleep inside my shiny new (spendy!) Go Up. Sigh.  Not only that, but they didn't even want to go inside it for even a second, and they were laying their eggs on the ground underneath it, (siiiiiigh.)

I tried enticing them up to it with treats, but they weren't having it.  They hated the ladder that came with the Go Up.  I even tried moving them into the coop after sunset, but they just angrily flew right back out, haha.

The following worked only because I have such a large run, and not the run that Omlet sells.  I took off the back panel, and left it off for a couple weeks.  I bought 2 fake ceramic eggs, (the pair cost $5 at my local feed store) and I placed them in the nesting box... I still leave the fakes in there.  I made a very simple and crude ladder to the back of the open coop out of an old tree trunk that they love, and a large tree branch.  They immediately started getting in and have laid their eggs in the nesting box ever since.

I left things set up just like that for a couple weeks, hoping they'd get into a solid routine with the Go Up.  A few days ago, I decided to put the back panel back on, (we are now having colder weather, so it's important that they use the coop as it's intended to be used.) I put the back panel back on the Go Up, and rotated it so that the door-side of the coop was facing the same direction as the open back had been previously facing.  I ditched the ladder entirely, they hate it.  They love using the old tree trunk/tree limb to climb up.  Then I just prayed that they wouldn't be too mind-boggled by these "massive changes."  I'm very pleased to say that after a couple days they are sleeping in the coop now, although the lowest girl in the pecking order is apparently the designated "look-out," so the other girls make her sleep with her head sticking out the door, (sigh... I'll keep working on that.)

Hope some of this advice helps you!  Good luck! - Makenna