racist hen

flutered

one of our hens hatched out three out of six eggs, two white chickens and one black one, first thing she done was to move from the nesting box to the ground with the two white ones, and left the black one behind, we then placed the black chick underneath her, she promptly got ris of the black one, we have tried this many times with no success, the black one is now happily living under an infra red lamp with a few more chicks.

kylith

AFAIK animals instinctively dislike members of their species which are different; e.g. grey wolves will drive a black wolf out of the pack. Instinct is probably telling your hen that this black chick is not properly camoflaged and that it would draw attention to the rest of her brood. Therefore driving it away would decrease the risk of the rest of the chicks being eaten by a predetor.

Of course, we know that in your back garden the colour of the chick makes no difference, but your hen doesn't know that.

Themadhouse

Lol. We had a litter of kittens last year. 3 were blue and 1 was White. The blues completely ignore the White one most of the time. The three of them would sleep in a kitten pile and poor White boy was always left out. We thought it strange because mammy cat is White too.