5. Vices
a) Feather picking and cannibalism
Occasionally, hens may pick at each other’s
feathers or vents causing serious trauma. This
behaviour is often induced by overcrowding,
poor ventilation, lack of adequate water or feeder
access, etc. Initially this vice may involve only
one animal but once it starts it can involve many
birds and is then hard to stop. If the individual bird
can be identified they should be isolated from
the other birds for a period. If on re-introduction
they continue with this activity they should be
permanently removed. Similarly any birds that have
been severely injured, traumatised or become
debilitated, should be permanently removed. The
best prevention is adequate space and ventilation,
and providing the birds with straw/scratch grain
(For example Eggstra’s High Performance Layer
Scratch Mix)/greed feed, etc to keep them
entertained.
b) Egg eating
Once an egg is broken most hens are inclined
to eat them. Some hens develop an unfortunate
vice of pecking at eggs to break them which then
encourages other hens. If these individuals can be
identified they should be eliminated as it is a hard
vice to stop once it starts. Strategies to prevent
egg eating include,
•
Appropriate nutritional balance to ensure good
shell strength
•
Sufficient litter in nest boxes to prevent
physical damage
•
Regular egg collection or roll-away nest
systems where the eggs roll beyond the hens
reach
Old remedies such as porcelain eggs or adding
mustard to a broken egg are not particularly
effective.
Occasionally, hens may pick at each other’s
feathers or vents causing serious trauma. This
behaviour is often induced by overcrowding,
poor ventilation, lack of adequate water or feeder
c) Broodiness
In the wild it was natural behaviour for hens to lay
a clutch of eggs, then go broody, and sit on the
eggs until they hatched. Selection for high egg
production in modern layers has all but removed
this instinct from the birds and they more or less
lay continuously. However, some hens (particularly
the non-commercial varieties) do still go broody.
Broody hens can be observed sitting in the nest
box well after the other hens have laid (most hens
lay early in the morning) and even remaining in the
nest at night. They show signs of ruffled feathers,
aggressiveness to anyone trying to collect the
eggs and a characteristic clucking noise. They can
be used to incubate fertile eggs but need to be
locked away from other birds for this purpose. If
not required for this purpose then the broodiness
can be broken by removal to a separate wired
floored coop for 3 – 4 days and then returned to
the flock.