Changing of the Guard?

We've had a rough three days at Red Door Coop.  We are learning that raising chickens is not all rainbows and unicorns.  It's mostly rainbows and unicorns, believe me, but imagine a few fire-breathing dragons thrown into the mix.

From this look at the birds in the yard today, you'd never know that they are having a falling out.

The problems started on Friday morning when I witnessed Bruiser and Fitz coming to blows: wing flapping, pecking, and chasing.  Fitz is the head hen and it seemed like she was attacking Bruiser.  Unfortunately, Fitz was pecked on her comb and it started to bleed.  Chickens and blood are not a good match.  It makes them nuts!  See the small dot of blood on the nesting box?  Not good.

Since I was headed to work and Papa Hen was out of town, I needed a solution that would keep the birds safe all day and I needed it fast.  The decision I made was difficult, but it seemed to work.  I brought the new coop in the garage outside to keep Fitz separated from the others for the day.  When I got home from work I was relieved to see that she was just fine.  Then I let the birds out in the yard together to see what would happen. Within seconds, Fitz and Bruiser were at it again.  It was hard to tell who started it, but they were both in full attack mode.  After more observation time and acting as referee it was clear that Bruiser was actually instigating things.  To solve things for the evening, I put her to bed in the garage and left Fitz with Bill and Lou in the coop.

Our initial take on the situation was that Bruiser was challenging Fitz for the position of head hen.  We've been expecting this to happen for awhile.

On Saturday we kept Bruiser separate from the other chickens after reading that the bully needs time away from the flock and the flock needs time away from the bully.  We reintegrated the four birds late Saturday night while they were sleeping in hopes that when they woke up, the fight would be forgotten.  Not a chance.  But Papa Hen and I took a tough love stance and left the four birds together while we went to a birthday brunch Sunday morning.  Was this the right decision?  Not sure.  But we thought that if this was a pecking order argument, then the birds needed to work it out on their own.  After the party, the situation in the coop was much the same, tense, so the birds were sent out into the yard to get a little space from one another.

Even though the birds were moving through the yard together and mostly staying together, there was much wing flapping, strutting, and pecking going on.  I couldn't get pictures, things happened so fast and frankly, I felt weird taking photos of this behavior.  Anyway, I continued to observe the chickens in the yard, breaking things up when needed.  Fitz tended to stay near but apart from Bruiser and Bill, but Lou seemed like a friend to her.  Truth be told, Lou and Bill switched alliances every few minutes.  Here's Fitz taking a break from Bruiser by hiding out in the coop while the other birds are in the yard.

 So what to do?  Online research indicated that a molting chicken with exposed red skin can attract unwanted aggression from other birds in the flock because of the color of the skin, red.  Putting that information together with the fact that Bruiser was going after Fitz's red-skinned bare head (with Bill following), I decided to separate Fitz from the flock.  It's obvious that she is exhausted from being on guard these last few days.  She needs time to rest while we figure out what to do.  So, it is Sunday evening now and Fitz went to bed in Red Door Coop Winter Quarters.

Being new to chicken keeping, we are making stuff up as we go.  It's all about experimentation and finding what works for our chickens.  Thank you, Internet community, for all the resources and ideas.  We'll keep you posted as things progress.

Does any of this make sense?  It's been chaotic and we just want to get things at Red Door Coop back to the new normal, whatever that is.