Operation Integration Day 1:
So far, so good. The worst part was the hissy fit when I crated the two bigs to take them to the little girl run. The are skittish and I can't pick them up them unless they are roosting, so I did that early. At daylight, I let the little girls out into the big run, then the put the bigs in the little run. I locked the bigs out of the littles coop, so they can't go in there to just pout and hide.
The bigs never acted scared. Not going to the corner to get away when the littles were at the fence checking them out, no signs of aggression such as flapping and trying to intimidate the littles. About 10 seconds of stretching out and strutting, but after that, the bigs are either at the fence acting nonchalant pecking in the dirt right up next to the littles on the other side, or ignoring them.
The littles are having a blast. Running and stretching their wings, exploring, and now and then going up to the bigs just to say hi.
If today and tomorrow continue to go well like this, do you think I can do the evening coop change about 30 minutes before dark by just letting the big girls out of the littles run to go to their own coop, and the littles then be able to go into their run and coop? Maybe with such little time actually together, it's more like passing each other on shift change?
