Hen question..

[karenjj]

Hi, not sure if this is in the right place?! Need Hen help!

I brought home 3 ex-batt. hens back in March and they have a little house and run in the back garden but I let them freerange in the day and then they get shut in their house at night.

They have never broken their routine.

Last night when I got home from work, one was missing when I went to shut their door. I looked around as much as I could in the dark and then this morning again for ages all around the garden, in the fields all through the farmer's fields - not a sign. I automatically thought as she didn't come home that she would not be alive but there are no feathers anywhere, I've never seen a fox about and the other two are fine.

Someone at work told me sometimes they get broody and hide? Has anyone got any experience of this? There's just no sign of her at all!!!

 

[kerilli]

yes, sometimes they do get broody and hide. sometimes they go a.w.o.l. for a while. sometimes they get the other side of a fence and can't work out how to get back. sometimes they just go off somewhere and die, too, i hate to say it...
fingers crossed she comes back!

 

[moandben]

ditto all of above, you might find she turns up today. were the others ok or did the seem a bit stressed? might of been a fox and just didn't see the other two.
fingers crossed she comes home today.

 

[karenjj]

Thanks the other two didn't seem upset at all, and both laid eggs this morning. It was only Saturday I took their "after" piccies, they were bald when we got them and now they look really healthy so I hope she's just hiding and comes out looking for food today. I haven't ever seen a fox in the area so fingers crossed.

 

[gails]

It is unusual for a battery hen to go broody, is it posible she has got her slef stuck somewhere?

Unfourtunatly, it does seem more likely that she has gone away to die

Will keep fingers crossed for you

 

[miller]

I lost one of ours like this last easter, OH was away and she didn't come back with the others. I lokoed round for ages and found nothing, knew where she had been 5 mins before.

2 days later next doo neighbour found the feathers 150 yards up the road in a hedge - believe it was a fox

On the flip side, one of our younger ones did the same and turned back up mid afternoon the following day with feathers rubbed off her back and a droopy wing - obv got underneath somtehing and couldn't get out but perfectly ok other than that and is still fine now.

Hope she turns up