Egg laying & meat chickens together?

nadiamaria3

Chirping
Jul 18, 2018
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I have 4 red egg laying chickens that are 17 weeks old. I’ve had them since they were chicks.
We have neighbors across the street who have very large chicken houses & raise meat chickens for sale. Today, we found one of there chickens wandering around. He was very tired & in need of some care but not hurt (bald bottom, some missing feathers on his sides). We put him in the coop with our other chickens. My question is, are all my reds going to be ok with the Cornish? I’ve heard they were aggressive. I’m new to all of this & this is my first time raising chickens. I just want to be sure all will be ok & get along. I have a chicken coop for all & I let them out daily to run around. I’ve also heard that Cornish get raised differently than the reds. (We have a gravity feeder & a water bucket with water nipples)
Any advice you can give would be greatly appreciated.
 
It's too late now but never mix a strange chicken in with your flock because that's how you spread diseases.
You also shouldn't put in a strange bird in your flock because it throws off the pecking order. If you are going to add to your flock it's best to have the new bird in a kennel in their run, where they can see each other but not touch until they get used to each other.
Lastly, meat birds need more protein then laying birds but the equipment(feeders/waterers) they use can be the same.
Are you planning on eating this bird? Cornish grow super fast to be able to cull early so they tend not to be as healthy or long lived like laying birds.
 
I thought of the same thing in the middle of the night. No, we are not going to eat it, we were just going to keep him & help him get better.
Do you think it’s to late if I take him out & clean out the coop? My girls were in their roosts & he laid on the ground. He was exhausted. Not sure if this matters but, he’s a good bit older than the reds. I’m thinking around 26 weeks.
 
I thought of the same thing in the middle of the night. No, we are not going to eat it, we were just going to keep him & help him get better.
Do you think it’s to late if I take him out & clean out the coop? My girls were in their roosts & he laid on the ground. He was exhausted. Not sure if this matters but, he’s a good bit older than the reds. I’m thinking around 26 weeks.
You can try. Especially since it sounds like he comes from a large flock. The large productions can be prone to disease and since you can never be sure what your neighbors biosecurity is like, I wouldn't chance it.

As far as how he'll get with the others, it depends on the birds themselves. You can hear stories about flocks that never have a problem integrating and others about how the flock killed the intruder. You never know.
 
I thought of the same thing in the middle of the night. No, we are not going to eat it, we were just going to keep him & help him get better.
Do you think it’s to late if I take him out & clean out the coop? My girls were in their roosts & he laid on the ground. He was exhausted. Not sure if this matters but, I think he’s about 52-60 weeks old. I know they
 
Ok, I just walked out here & this is not going to work. My 4 girls were absolutely trying to kill him. They were all attacking him & he was just huddled in a corner with his head down. So now, I have him out & them in their coop. I may have to try & find someone to take him. I don’t have any runs to put him in.
 
Yes, adding single new bird into an established flock is not a good idea.
I won't go into the integration protocols that work best.

But the biggest thing here is that a meat bird is not meant to live for very long.
They are bred to get very large very fast and are usually slaughtered at about 8 weeks old.

The best thing to do, IMO, would be to take the meat bird back across the street to the meat bird farm where it belongs.
 

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