when to let new chicks free range with existing flock

Hi,
I have an existing flock of 14 hens and I let them out of their pen containing their coop every late afternoon to free range. They put themselves back in the pen at dark and I go and shut the door. My question is...I have 12 new chicks that are ready to join this flock. When I put them together, how long should I wait before I let them all out to free range? Will the newbies know to return to the pen? Do they need to be in there a while before they call it "home"? I know that my girls enjoy their evening run around the yard so anytime that I can't let them out, they get upset.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
thanks

I'm pretty new to this but I heard that you cannot incorporate new girls to the older girls right away. I would think that if all the girls get along, they will al naturally go to bed together. Mine also go to bed at a certain time every night without issue.

cntrycritters said:

Hi,
I have an existing flock of 14 hens and I let them out of their pen containing their coop every late afternoon to free range. They put themselves back in the pen at dark and I go and shut the door. My question is...I have 12 new chicks that are ready to join this flock. When I put them together, how long should I wait before I let them all out to free range? Will the newbies know to return to the pen? Do they need to be in there a while before they call it "home"? I know that my girls enjoy their evening run around the yard so anytime that I can't let them out, they get upset.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
thanks

Click to expand...

How old are your new chicks?
How do you plan to integrate the chicks with the existing flock?
Where are the chicks living now?

Thanks for your interest. My chicks are 3 months old and have been living in a separate pen outside for the past month. They are full feathered and 2 of them are 4 months old. I was planning on putting a divider inside my chicken pen. This pen has 2 large coops in it and my current flock of 14 are only using the one. I thought after a week or so of this arrangement then taking down the divider and letting them together. My main concern is that my older flock love getting their afternoon/evening time out of the pen. Will my new chicks know to come back at dark like the others?

Can the adults see the younger ones now? If they can I’d just open it up and let them free range together. I generally do that anywhere from 5 to 8 weeks of age for the younger ones but my brooder is in the coop and my grow-out pen and run is right next to the adults. They are used to each other. What I’d expect to happen is that the adults will go back to the main coop at dark and the younger ones will go back to where they are used to. That is good for a while. There is nothing wrong with them getting to know each other during the day but sleeping separately at night.

At some point before they start to lay you probably want them in the big coop. I normally do that at 12 weeks for pullets but you have a bit more time. The important thing is to have them in the main coop before they start to lay. The older hens will teach them how to do that. When I’m ready to move my pullets to the main coop, I lock the door to the grow-out coop. They normally crowd around the closed door at bedtime, so after dark I physically put them in the main coop and lock that door. I leave that grow-out coop locked after that. Sometimes all it takes is once to get them to start going to bed with the big girls, sometimes it takes a few times of putting them in after dark. The next morning I just treat them like the big girls.

They will probably be afraid of the big girls, even if they get along pretty well. They may start roosting on the main roosts, especially if you have plenty of room on the roosts, but sometimes they won’t stay on the main roosts. The big girls can be pretty mean on the roosts. It’s a pecking order thing and the young ones are at the bottom of the pecking order. The young ones might look for a safer place to sleep than the roosts. That might be your nests or some other place. You’ll have to play that by ear, see what happens. I do that kind of integrating all the time and I wound up putting a separate roost lower than the main roost and horizontally separated but still higher than my nests to give them a safe place to sleep that is not my nests. I don’t know if you are going to have this kind of problem or not. Sometimes I do, sometimes I don’t, but that separate roost really helped.

Good luck with it.

cntrycritters said:

Thanks for your interest. My chicks are 3 months old and have been living in a separate pen outside for the past month. They are full feathered and 2 of them are 4 months old. I was planning on putting a divider inside my chicken pen. This pen has 2 large coops in it and my current flock of 14 are only using the one. I thought after a week or so of this arrangement then taking down the divider and letting them together. My main concern is that my older flock love getting their afternoon/evening time out of the pen. Will my new chicks know to come back at dark like the others?

Click to expand...

I think keeping the youngers in the other coop and divided pen for a week or so is a great idea...then let them range together.
That week in the coop will 'home' them so they should return at dusk...maybe let the youngers out to free range late in the day(an hour ro so before dark) the first time.