Help needed with buying chickens!! Please help!!

[ChickyChickens]

Hey to whoever is reading this,
This is a forum on buying chickens! I know this is a weird topic but I know of many people who ask questions of how , what and when to buy chickens! SO if you have any questions on buying chickens then this is the place to go!!

So anyway I have a question! When I started keeping chickens I bought 1 rooster and 10 hens! I just wanted to keep these for the eggs and just for the fun of keeping chickens! I wanted the rooster because he was beautiful and I loved his crow! So anyway these chickens ended up breeding and getting chicks! (They got chicks because I free ranged them! I had nest boxes in their run but some decided outside is a better place to lay!) One day I couldn't find one of my hens and I concluded that she must have been stolen! But then 3 or so weeks later out came this hen with 19 chicks! I was soo happy and decided to carry on letting the chickens breed! And I let the hen raise her chicks!

Anyway all those chicks made it and lucky to me they were all hens! I was soo happy because I now had 19 more hens to add to my flock! These chickens all just carried on reproducing and now I have a flock of 66 chickens free ranging around the farm! Sometimes when there are too many roosters around I sell them just to keep the hens happy and featherful! ( My hens lose the feathers on their backs when there are to many roosters around because the roosters mate them to much in doing so rip the feathers off of their backs)( I know they don't mean it , but I feel sorry for mu chooks)

So to get to the buying point!
I have never ever bought chickens ( Except for my first 11)
So I am buying two hens from our neighbours that live about 100 metres away from us! I have already tried to bring them to the house but they just carry on running back to the neighbours house! The neighbours told me that I must cover their eyes so that they cant see the way back! I have tried that but it still doesn't work because they already know the way back!

Can anyone give me ideas on how I can keep the chickens on my side of the farm??
Thanx!

 

[iwiw60]

What a dilemma!! I haven't a clue, but must tell you I read your post with great enthusiasm....good writing! All kidding aside, I hope you can get it figured out soon!!

 

[ChickyChickens]

What a dilemma!! I haven't a clue, but must tell you I read your post with great enthusiasm....good writing! All kidding aside, I hope you can get it figured out soon!!

Thank you very much !! I hope I will!!!!!!

 

[Ridgerunner]

What a fun story. Try locking them in their new home for about a week so they can't go back home. Since yours range that might present a challenge, so put them in some kind of cage in your coop. It may take longer than a week so you may have to repeat this, but eventually they will start thinking of your place as their new home.

 

[Rocky Rhodes]

What a fun story. Try locking them in their new home for about a week so they can't go back home. Since yours range that might present a challenge, so put them in some kind of cage in your coop. It may take longer than a week so you may have to repeat this, but eventually they will start thinking of your place as their new home.

Ridgerunner has the solution here.

Also, if you free range multiple roosters they would eventually begin to fight and the fights would get worse with age. You can protect your girls backs with saddle aprons with or without wing guards.

 

[20736]

Yep.
Confine them fora week or two, they will adapt to the new surroundings.
However, they are very close to their old home, well within freeranging distance, so this may be a continuing saga.
Good Luck with it.

 

[ChickyChickens]

What a fun story. Try locking them in their new home for about a week so they can't go back home. Since yours range that might present a challenge, so put them in some kind of cage in your coop. It may take longer than a week so you may have to repeat this, but eventually they will start thinking of your place as their new home.

I have a coop with a fence around it! The fence is there to keep the chickens in on days I don't want them to go out and range! Do you think it is okay if I let the flock out and then leave the new ones inside for a week??

 

[ChickyChickens]

Ridgerunner has the solution here.

Also, if you free range multiple roosters they would eventually begin to fight and the fights would get worse with age. You can protect your girls backs with saddle aprons with or without wing guards.

I have heard of these before! The problem is that I live in Vryheid, KwaZulu-Natal , South Africa and I cant find any of them!!

 

[Ridgerunner]

Can the others get to their nests to lay eggs and can they roost where you want them to? You don't wan to teach the others to lay somewhere else and hide a nest and you don't want them to learn to roost somewhere else.

You might have to leave them all confined, but if the run is big enough, that should work really well. To me, that is the best solution if the run is big enough.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Chicken Saddle Patterns
https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=407575