posted 8 years ago
In the zookeeping world (my previous profession), we call "interesting distractions so the animals don't get too bored" "enrichment."
When you're thinking about enrichment for captive animals, you want to engage all their senses (not necessarily every day--you can rotate different sensory experiences day by day) and provide experiences that mimic their natural environment and encourage them to use natural behaviors as much as possible. So think about what a chicken would be doing if it were running around free, choosing where to go and what to do on their own. Try to duplicate some of those experiences, or get close to duplicating them.
Also think about which senses are important to chickens. They use hearing and sight, obviously, but like most birds their sense of smell is not well developed and apparently not that important to them (so interesting smells, like cinnamon sprinkled around their enclosure, wouldn't do much to alleviate their boredom.) Because they don't have a well-developed sense of smell, we don't know whether they are sensitive to flavors, so you can probably leave out taste stimulation, too. Their sense of touch is important, as they scratch through soil to find things to eat. We all have senses beyond the five we typically think about, too: balance, heat sensation, difference between light and dark (which affects more of our systems than just our eyes--particularly true for many birds, which seem to be triggered to lay eggs--or not lay them--by available daylight), etc.
Some natural behaviors chickens exhibit: scratching, pecking at scraggly-looking objects (like their friends' feathers), roosting/perching, going inside nest boxes, foraging through a variety of plant heights, dust bathing, etc.
So there are some enrichments I might rotate in and out of a chicken enclosure:
Day 1: Shallow container filled with dry soil for dust baths.
Day 2: Hang brightly colored ribbons or paper streamers inside the enclosure at convenient pecking height. ("Convenient Pecking Height" is going to be the name of my rap album when I finally drop that sick ish.)
Day 3: Place a roost wrapped in green plastic "turf" inside the enclosure. This will give them something new to feel when they jump up and stand on it.
Day 4: Shallow container filled with loose soil; mix in some of their favorite treats (corn, mealworms, etc.) to encourage scratching.
Day 5: Place a few trimmings from pruning the trees inside so they can run through the foliage.
Day 6: Cardboard boxes turned on their sides so they can explore them as if they're nesting cavities.
Day 7: Throw a few brightly colored balls into the enclosure for them to peck at.
Day 8: Live-trap a few mice and release them inside the enclosure for the chickens to hunt and kill (only do this if you're reasonably sure your chickens are good mouse hunters!)
Day 9: Play a radio near the enclosure for new sounds.
Day 10: Run the sprinkler on a low setting near one end of the enclosure.
Day 11: Hang brightly colored ribbons inside enclosure (again)
...
You can continue to rotate ideas you've used before.
The crucial thing with enrichment is to remove the items daily, so they don't grow bored with those entertainments. Enrichment should be novel and exciting every time, not something that becomes a permanent fixture of their lives.
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