Bad behaviour, or is it?

I think my girls have shown some bad behaviour today but that’s just my opinion. As far as they are concerned their behaviour is perfectly fine.

It started when we had to go out and I went up and locked the chicken’s gate ready to leave. Pepper and Dotty were having a lovely dust bath together when I saw Pepper start plucking at Dotty’s neck feathers. I shouted at her but as I was outside of the run she took no notice of me.

The next minute the little girls had started scrapping again. I ran back to the house for the padlock keys and let myself back into the run. By now Dotty was on the branch perch, Pepper was looking innocent and the banty’s skirmish was over (much shorter and less aggressive than a few days ago).

We had to leave and I consoled myself with the knowledge that they probably do all these things when I am not there and there is nothing I can do about it.

I have done some research into the fighting and haven’t come across anyone else with girls fighting after being happy together most of the time. I am wondering if it is hormones. The first time the little girls scrapped like this was just before they both started to lay eggs last summer.

They haven’t laid since they began their moult four months ago but Honey’s comb has recently got much redder and she has been going to the grit for the last few days. Amber started laying a few weeks later than Honey in the summer but had been showing all the signs that she was getting ready.

I wonder if the fact they are getting ready to lay again has caused a rush of hormones and they are testing the pecking order. I also think it must be part of their breed, they are very feisty and full of attitude. Amber is definitely the top girl of these two.

Honey has a lovely red comb again

This photo shows that Amber has a bit missing from the top of her comb

Amber was always the most feisty and during the integration period with the big girls she had the top part of her comb pecked off.

I can’t imagine the big girls scrapping like these little girls do but I think there are probably many reasons for this. Pepper and Dotty (and Poppy) had been together with us from two months old but even before that they were kept together at the farm while I waited for them to be old enough for us to collect and bring home. We brought Bluebell home a month later when we took Poppy back because Poppy turned out to be a cockerel. Pepper and Dotty have always been totally bonded and Bluebell has been a bit of a loner.

Honey and Amber had been together in a big mixed flock at the farm where we got them from. We collected them nine months ago at about six months old. What they had in common was being about the same age and size, the same breed and arriving together to join our flock. This means they stick together but are not bonded like Pepper and Dotty and right from the start Amber would peck at Honey to show her that Honey was below her in the pecking order.

At bedtime I went in to the girls and the little girls had settled together in the coop.

Dotty is always the first to settle on the coop roof

Pepper joins Dotty on the coop roof

Dotty will often flutter her head under Pepper and snuggles right up to her. This is why I know the plucking is not malicious and what I think of as bad behaviour they just do as part of their bonding.

Bluebell joins them but I don’t know what they are all looking at!

Finally maybe it’s a bad habit that they don’t go in the coop at night but wait for me to put them in. My eldest son says I have trained them to do this but I didn’t mean to it just seemed to happen. Somehow I have spoiled them!

If these things are bad behaviour, I will have to just accept it because it is just the way they are. As long as they are happy and healthy I will just have to try not to stress about these things. They will do what they want to do and they are so full of personality that I really can’t hold a bit of behaviour against them. They are our funny girls and I love them dearly.