Chicken afraid of Chickens

[Stephanie Mitchell]

My polish, Podrick, had an incident at least a month ago when her and a group of youngsters (11 three month old chicks) joined my main flock (10 hens, 1 rooster). Unfortunately Podrick was almost killed, and I nursed her back to health. For a short time, she lived alone, beside the main coop divided by a hardware cloth wall. When I found Piper, a young pullet, was sick (grew up with Podrick originally and had integrated successfully with the adults), my only option was to move her into the pen with Podrick and treat them both for the sickness. At first Podrick was afraid, but Piper had an infection and could hardly see anything so it didn't take long for them to become friends.

I've attempted to add the two outcasts back into the main flock. Both Podrick and Piper are smaller than the chickens their same age; much smaller due to Piper being sick and Podrick being Polish. While I know Piper will probably integrate well back in with the adults, Podrick can't hold herself together. She's fine for about 5 seconds, then she acts as if someone's going to get her, and because of this prey like behaviour, the other chickens chase her.

Will she ever grow out of this? If I supervise their visits with eachother, will they stop trying to kill her? I'm starting to lose hope and resign to the idea of always having this poor hen live separate.

 

[Spartan22]

Polish will kind of act weird because they can’t really see much, that attracts pecking since they can’t read social cues of other chickens. I have 2 white crested black polish that sometimes get pecked on, but I got a roo that grew up with them that kept everyone behave and peaceful.

 

[micstrachan]

I only have experience integrating once. Well, twice. Once integrating a sick hen back into the flock and once integrating two flocks. The playpen method (I used a mini manufactured coop) worked great, but with the two flicks, had to take it very slow. They are fully integrated now, but the pecking order still stands and the lower ranked girls give the top ranked girls space. If they don’t, the higher ranked girls are quick to remind them.
Having said that, supervised freerange time to get to know each other helped a lot, too. Just be diligent and have patience, and I think it will eventually be OK. Good luck!

 

[Stephanie Mitchell]

Thank you. I don't free range as my chickens are on the border of a forest and a town at my grandparents property, they would have to have supervised run access instead unfortunately