Topic of the Week - Integrating Chicks into an Adult Flock

[MyFlockIsMyLife]

Oh wait sorry, we actually have 3 leghorns now, one got taken by a bobcat yesterday,

I know it’s the circle of life but I hate losing any of my girls or boys to predators. So sad! I hope you didn’t have to clean up the mess of blood and bits of meat and bone and feathers strewn about your yard the way I did when hawks got 2 of my girls a couple years ago…traumatic in its own way.

 

[MyFlockIsMyLife]

Those are some pretty birds

Thank you so much! I think so too haha they’re literally my life blood. Between my chickens and my garden- I have everything that makes me happy and I never want to leave home hahaha

 

[MyFlockIsMyLife]

It’s a mix called Rhode Island Blue

can’t remember what it mixed View attachment 3841760with.
This is them just under a week old.

They’re beautiful!!!!

 

[Sylvester017]

Our 3 older girls on one side of deer fencing (one old Dominique and 2 Silkie hens) with 3 new Silkie pullets on near side of deer fencing.

For a couple weeks we let them all see each other thru the fencing. At night we put the new Silkies in a corner of the coop on pine shavings and used their old brooder panels as a wall for privacy -- the brooder panels and pine shavings were familiar to them as chicks so they settled in typical Silkie pile-up slumber at night.

OPEN COOP DOOR SHOWS SECTION OF SILKIE SLUMBER AREA

Took 2-3 days for all 6 girls to get familiar w/sharing coop and yard. The 3 older girls toodle the whole yard in their own flock while the 3 new Silkies toodle together in their own flock. So glad the 3 new girls have each other to toodle with -- it would've been much harder to integrate just one new pullet alone into an existing flock.

Also, having multiple feeding/watering stations around the yard keeps down squabbling.