Help with Integrating new chickens.

[Jessrosen04]

I have a flock of 13 chickens which includes a bantam rooster. The flock is mixed with satins, frizzles, polishes, silkies, Delaware’s or Columbian Wyandotte’s, not sure, an Isa Brown and two D’uncles. This flock is about 16-18 weeks old. The rooster might be older as I acquired him about a month and a half ago but am not quite sure in the age. He is just started crowing. Before Intergrating him into our flock I had two younger smaller roosters, a polish and a bantam. Both ended up dying which we thought maybe have been from diseases but now I am starting to doubt that. About 8 weeks ago I bought an Easter egger, a green queen and another polish chick to replace the polish rooster that had died. They have grown up together and it looks like the polish is a roo and the other two are pullets. I tried to integrate them into the flock about a week ago. They seemed to be doing ok. Keeping to themselves, getting picked on just a bit but not enough for me to think there was an issue. Well yesterday the polish rooster looked sick. So I separated him gave him heat, water and food and seems to have miraculously recovered. Could it be that my bantam rooster was starving him and not allowing him to eat??? And if so what do I do? The Easter egger and green queen seem to be the polish roos hens so they would not come out of the coop this morning. I had join them with their polish roo for now into a brooder. Do I have to buy a new coop if I want the polish roo and his hens to have a chance?

 

[sourland]

I would provide more feed and water stations and monitor flock behavior.

 

[Mrs. K]

When you add more feed stations, use a box, or a piece of plywood, or a tote laid on its side. What you want to do is set up the second feed bowl so that while eating at one station, they cannot see a bird at another station.

 

[Jessrosen04]

Ok I have pvc pipe feeders in the run. I will set up some sort plywood in between and see if that helps.