Five Week Old Bully Chicks

[FreecoastMomma]

Hey y'all! We expanded our brooder today, giving our chicks three times as much space as they previously had. We have 6 Gold Sex Links that are four weeks old and 6 Black Sex Links that are five weeks old. These chicks have all lived together since they were 1 and 2 weeks old. But today, they've turned into a pack of peckers. Two the gold sex links have bloody butts from being bullied.

We separated our injured ladies (is that the right call?) and closely watched the ten others. They are all chasing and pecking at each other pretty harshly.

It seems like I won't be able to separate the bullies, since they are almost all guilty. But should I try to single out the worst offenders and separate them? Do I keep the injured ladies separate until they heal? We go out of town for 8 days, leaving in 36 hours, so I worry about the pet sitters having to deal with this. Any advice is appreciated!

Update: Four of the six gold chicks have bloody spots. So we went ahead and moved all six gold girls to the home we'd moved them out of earlier today. And immediately saw them pecking at each other's bloody spots.

Leaving on vacation in a day and a half, leaving chicks with pet sitters who will check on them twice a day, that makes me nervous.

 

[Kiki]

1st...how hot is your brooder?
TOO hot can cause pecking.

You will need to put some blu kote over the pecked spots...
the more they see blood the more they will peck at it.

 

[FreecoastMomma]

It's definitely not too hot. It's mid-70's here and our garage is cooler than that. They are off the heat lamp now. I picked up some blue kote today at Tractor Supply. Thanks!

 

[aart]

three times as much space as they previously had

..and just how big is that...in feet by feet??
They are old enough to be in the coop.

I'm guessing lack of space is the main problem.

Blukote can be a good antiseptic, but I've found it can attract as much pecking attention as blood, and the bird it is applied to often tries to preen it off making wound worse, so don't count on it being a miracle cure.