Chicken Grandma

goldysgirl · Aug 7, 2019

EastTeaxsChickenMimi said:
Each time I think I've found a favorite another comes along and I changes my mind. TSC handed my granddaughter their smallest Bantam the other day after their delivery and when it latched on to her finger I didn't think I would get out of there without it. Unfortunately we weren't ready to bring any home yet.

Do you separate your Bantams from the large fowl? I've read that they need to be separated, but I have noticed that many people are raising both.

This year I got about 20 new chickens. I bought 8 TSC birds that were supposed to be bantams, but ended up being large fowl silkies. Three weeks later about 12 bantams arrived in the mail. They were delayed due to weather. I had to wait several weeks (about six?) to integrate them all together gradually because the silkies were like giant T rexs against my little bantams. Now I have 2 flocks. One has the big silkies and the bantams in a fenced coup and the other flock is bantam roos, big silkie roo and hens, and 2 ederly large fowl hens. I haven't noticed any problems due to size differences. I think it is definitely best to get all of your birds at once so that they grow up together. You are much less likely to run into aggression problems, plus if you end up with two batches that you can't combine, you have to have 2 brooders.