Bulling the Youngest Chicken

[oldhenlikesdogs]

They free range the entire yard during the day. When the Easter Eggers get aggressive, we separate them to the side yard which is 5' wide and 60' long.

So there are two different flocks in two different areas? Integration is best done where everyone can see each other through a fence. Every time you remove some out of sight you start all over. The older hens are defending their territory from the new invaders.

It's always best to integrate young chicks into a flock. Older ones are harder. Size of the coop can dictate whether there's enough room for more. Submissive members need to remain at least 5 feet away, 10 is better. So in a smaller coop people will have problems because they aren't built with the rules of the pecking order in mind. Chickens need way more room than what is often recommended. Those recommendations are generally for confined debeaked birds.

 

[aart]

Size of the coop can dictate whether there's enough room for more. Submissive members need to remain at least 5 feet away, 10 is better.

Ditto Dat^^^
Coop size does matter too. The coop can be where battles begin..so crowding there, even if they 'only sleep there', can create aggressive behaviors that are continued all thru the day.
A narrow run can exacerbate the aggression, because subordinates cannot get far enough away.

 

[jeanpr]

The chickens are free range. The attacks occur when they are free ranging in the yard. Can someone please provide comment about what to do with free range chickens.
Thank you

 

[MissChick@dee]

Pinless peepers! Check them out. There’s videos on YouTube.

 

[chickengeorgeto]

Chickens see different light spectrums than humans do. It is also more problematic trying to keep a dukes mixture of chickens than it is a flock that resembles each other. If you will do a little research into how a chicken sees its world you can get a better idea.

Hint, notice how (like in this case) most of the time there is one breed of hen squaring off against a dissimilar hen.

Try this, take one of your top hens and put a large area of shoe polish on her plumage and see if her flock mates still recognizes her.

 

[Acre4Me]

The chickens are free range. The attacks occur when they are free ranging in the yard. Can someone please provide comment about what to do with free range chickens.
Thank you

Good luck. Sounds like you could:
1. re-home the sex-link
3. Separate out the most aggressive EE. Out of sight of the flock for a week. Monitor the flock behavior. Re-introduce the aggressive EE. This might shake things up a bit.

Sometimes animals don’t get along. We have 3 of one breed, all raised with the other 11birds (all same age). The head cockerel just doesn’t like them at all. Chases them, picks on them (no blood that I’ve seen). But we alleviate some of this with food in two locations, so head boy can’t run them away from both feeders. We have a 10’ x 50’ run with visual blinds (areas to get out of line of sight), which helps. Sounds like you have plenty if room too.