Sassy’s Saddle

We have a chicken named Sassy, Sassy Red specifically.  She’s a Rhode Island Red from last year’s flock. 

We have a rooster named Boots.  He’s a Brahma and therefore has feathered feet.  He’s actually a very good rooster as far as rooster’s go.  He’s relatively quiet and docile.

Sassy appears to be Boots’ favorite hen.  This has it’s up sides and down sides.  When Boots gets a tasty treat he shares with Sassy first.  Sassy suffers from too much “love” from Boots though, so Sassy gets a saddle.

When roosters mate with a hen they step up on the hen’s back, dig in their talons, and often grab the hen’s comb or head feathers in their beak to hang on.  The unfortunate effect of this, if the rooster-to-hen ratio is off or (as in Sassy’s case) he has a particular preference, is that the hen can suffer from missing feathers which can eventually lead to actual wounds.  In order to prevent this, many chicken farmers leverage a “saddle”.  They are reportedly easy to sew, but I suffer from occasional bouts of laziness.  I ordered Sassy’s saddle from Hen Saver. (You know you talk chickens too much when the Gmail targeted advertising shows you things like this regularly.)

The saddle was simple enough to put on. When we closed the hens up that night we simply picked up Sassy and slipped her wings through the straps and set her back in the coop. She immediately became confused and proceeded to thrash around the coop trying to walk backwards to get the thing off. I became increasingly distressed during this behavior as I was trying to help her, not hurt or scare her. She settled down for the night and we turned off the coop light to ensure she got no undue attention from the other hens. The next morning she was much better adjusted and only had a couple moments of trying to walk backwards. Once she had a chance to stretch her wings a bit more the saddle seemed to settle and she seemed entirely unphased by it.

So far it appears to be having the desired effect and Sassy’s back is protected from the aggressive affection of Boots.