Eat her in front of the others to make an example
Replacing her would cost me money since there are no roosters in the city. Unfortunately not an option.
Lock her out the coop
I think I may start doing this.
Likely won’t work. Hormones are powerful things. Pick up hen, soak her bottom in cold water, hose or bucket. Changing temp of bottom changes hormones, chicken will snap out of it after 1-3 treatments.
I've heard of that too. Sounds harder, but imagine I will try it if physical barriers don't work.
Push her ass off and take them. If you keep on it and she doesn't have a lot of chances to just hang out sitting on eggs, she might eventually get discouraged and stop. You gotta break her spirit.
Is she keeping other girls from laying because of it?
Nah she hasn't kept the other girls from laying. Just steals their eggs and sits on them. I kick her ass out every day and take the eggs, but she still just goes back to the nesting box.
I think I'm gonna start locking her out.
You could stick her in a decent size dog crate (or something similar) for a few days and grab her eggs asap. Then when you let her out, she'll be too excited to run around and scratch than to want to go sit on a box.
I think what I'll try first is either block off the nesting box or just lock her in the run.
I thought they don't really lay when they're brooding.
Same thing you do w/ your wife I tell ya what. Eat it.
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