Putting a single 1yr old hen in with four 8 week old chicks? *UPDATE*

SUCCESS!!!!!

It's day 4 (I think LOL) and tonight when I checked on them they were all sharing the top roost, although Penny was at one end, and the chicks at the other.

She still chasees them around the coop relentlessly but I've put extra food and water up high next to the outside roost/perch and they can escape from her up there and not starve or dehydrate.

Well it's been a couple of weeks and I'm so pleased to report that all five girls are getting on well and there have been no injuries at all, only a bit of "hair pulling" from time to time. They are all roosting on the same roosts at night, sharing food and playing nicely.

I let the little girls out to range for about 30 mins today (heading towards dusk) and the young girls, who are now about 10 weeks old, took their cue from Penny and followed her around the yard learning where all the good bugs were.

I'm so relieved that we managed to integrate them with no injuries at all! It was definitely a gamble, but it has paid off for us.

Good update.

Congratulations. I've had a broody wean chicks at three weeks, so young chicks can be integrated with a flock. But there is risk involved. I'm really glad it worked out for you.

What a great ending to your story! I will be getting 12 one-day-olds in April. I also have two 5-yr. old girls that I've been contemplating how to integrate them in with the new ones, once they get to be about 8-10 weeks old. Your story is encouraging and I will probably try it.

I'm so happy it worked fo you, but honestly, I REALLY hope that this doesn't inspire other people to try this. This doesn't happen very often, and some hens can kill chicks at this age. If you do have to try this, watch them at all times and remove them if serious picking starts. I tried integrating at 12 weeks and my hens almost killed my white leghorn and bloodied her neck, and later ripped her comb open. Please wait.

I hope this inspires people to think about it. I really think a huge key to how well this works is space. I don't have any trouble integrating brooder raised chicks at 8 weeks, but they have lots of room, like free range type of room. I don't have fatalities when broodies raise the chicks with the flock and wean their chicks at 3 to 4 weeks of age.

There are pecking order issues when the chicks are younger, but if they have room to avoid the older chickens, they work this out. There are other factors than space, such as the personality of some hens, but many of us have been integrating chicks for years, both broody-raised and brooder-raised, without losing any. Any time you deal with living animals there are risks involved. But we all have different situations and different circumstances. Because one person has a problem does not mean everyone will, any more than because one person did not have a problem does not mean that no one will. What works for me won't work for everyone else, any more than what went wrong with yours will necessarily go wrong with anyone else.

Ridgerunner said:

I hope this inspires people to think about it. I really think a huge key to how well this works is space. I don't have any trouble integrating brooder raised chicks at 8 weeks, but they have lots of room, like free range type of room. I don't have fatalities when broodies raise the chicks with the flock and wean their chicks at 3 to 4 weeks of age.
There are pecking order issues when the chicks are younger, but if they have room to avoid the older chickens, they work this out. There are other factors than space, such as the personality of some hens, but many of us have been integrating chicks for years, both broody-raised and brooder-raised, without losing any. Any time you deal with living animals there are risks involved. But we all have different situations and different circumstances. Because one person has a problem does not mean everyone will, any more than because one person did not have a problem does not mean that no one will. What works for me won't work for everyone else, any more than what went wrong with yours will necessarily go wrong with anyone else.

Click to expand...

I'm glad it worked for you!

I think the ONLY reason it worked as well as it did was because the smaller chicks had a definite advantage of not only their numbers (they had the majority 4 against 1) but also it was their turf the older hen was coming into. Had these two factors not been in play It would most likely not have gone so well. It may also have helped that Penny had just lost her mate so was perhaps less inclined to fight to be #1 and happier just to have some company.

They had pretty close supervision the first few days with me sitting there in the the coop with them a lot, separating them as necessary so the littlies could get some free play without Penny in the run with them, but aside from that I didn't intervene if there was pecking or squawking as it was clear it was all posturing and no one was getting anything but their pride hurt. I also put a whole lot of treats in there to distract them, and gave the littlies places to hide, and plenty of access to food/water so Penny couldn't keep them off it.

So with the usual disclaimer of "kids, don't try this at home".... I could not have hoped for a better outcome.

hello,
sadly we lost all but one of our flock to a mink/weasel. We are thinking to give our healthy survivor to friends with 3x3 month old chicks. Your introduction posting sounds encouraging, and I'm wondering how it all settled.
Thanks for you insights.