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Chickens are very social animals, but sometimes also a bit like pubescent teenagers who get into each other’s hair from time to time. Who gets the best spot on the roost or is allowed to help themselves to the food first determines a rather complex hierarchy that chickens establish among themselves over time. It can happen that animals rise or fall in rank. Small, usually quite harmless fights regulate this pecking order in the coop. If things get too wild and you have a reasonably experienced cockerel, he will settle bad squabbles between your ladies.
To ensure less quarrelling among your poultry, you can scatter the grains more widely when feeding them. You should also make sure that the perches in your hutch are at the same height. Of course, a large run with enough places to hide and escape is also good to prevent arguments from escalating.
Of course, the temperament and combativeness of your chickens also depends on their breed. If you keep fighting chickens, you shouldn’t be surprised about regular squabbles.
New chickens
Newly purchased or growing chickens in particular are quite low down in the pecking order. If you want to integrate new chickens with your existing ones, it is best to do this at night. Open the coop door, put the new chickens on the roost with the old ones in the dark and close the door. Chickens have very poor eyesight in the dark. You may notice that there are strangers, but you can’t take any major action against them.
The next morning, the newcomers will already smell of the stable and will no longer be so strange. Make sure that the automatic flap control of your coop opens earlier the next morning. This way the chickens can avoid each other better and there is no fighting in the coop, where it is narrower and there is a greater risk of injury.
Over the course of the next few days, the new ones become more and more integrated and part of the existing pecking order.