Introducing 2- 3 year old chickens to our 3- 16 week olds

lkstevenschicks

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We are looking at taking in (2) 3 year old hens to add to our current flock of 16 week olds. I see a ton of posts on introducing babies but what about 4 month olds and 3 year olds. I don't have a separate coop to put the older ones in and see a ton of people posting about keeping them separate. Our 16 week old chicks just free range in the backyard and go into the coop at night. Would it be a bad idea to bring the older ones home? I feel like there large enough to defend themselves and possibly young enough to let the older ones just take over. Any suggestions? This all so new to me. I keep reading stuff and I'm starting to get discouraged.
 
You have 2 situations. The older birds will be the outsiders because the younger ones are home so it will probably work.

The more serious concern is biosecurity and quarantining.
It's recommended to quarantine new birds a minimum of 2 weeks as far from your current flock as possible.
4 to 6 weeks is better because some diseases have incubation periods more than 2 weeks.

http://www.depi.vic.gov.au/agricult...ry/quarantine-advice-for-small-poultry-flocks
 
How many 16 week olds do you have?

I don't think integrating new birds without separate enclosures is a good idea.
Bio secure quarantine is very difficult to do without separate coops that are far apart.

Lots of space would help...multiple feed/water stations...separate roosts....places to hide 'out of line of sight' and/or up and away from aggressors are all very helpful, necessary IMO.

It's about territory and resources(food/water), the existing birds will not like the new birds encroaching on their territory.



Here's some notes I've taken on integration that I found to be very helpful.......
......take what applies or might help and ignore the rest.
See if any of them, or the links provided at the bottom, might offer some tips that will assist you in your situation:

Integration of new chickens into flock.


Consider medical quarantine:
BYC Medical Quarantine Article
Poultry Biosecurity
BYC 'medical quarantine' search

Confine new birds within sight but physically segregated from older/existing birds for several weeks, so they can see and get used to each other but not physically interact. Integrating new birds of equal size works best.

For smaller chicks I used a large wire dog crate right in the coop for the smallers. I removed the crate door and put up a piece of wire fencing over the opening and bent up one corner just enough for the smallers to fit thru but the biggers could not. Feed and water inside the crate for the smallers. Make sure the smallers know how to get in and out of the crate opening before exposing them to the olders. this worked out great for me, by the time the crate was too small for the them to roost in there(about 3 weeks), they had pretty much integrated themselves to the olders.

If you have too many smallers to fit in a crate you can partition off part of the coop with a wire wall and make the same openings for smallers escape.


The more space, the better. Birds will peck to establish dominance, the pecked bird needs space to get away. As long as there's no blood drawn and/or new bird is not trapped/pinned down, let them work it out. Every time you interfere or remove new birds, they'll have to start the pecking order thing all over again.

Multiple feed/water stations. Dominance issues are most often carried out over sustenance, more stations lessens the frequency of that issue.

Places for the new birds to hide out of line of sight and/or up and away from any bully birds.

Read up on integration..... BYC advanced search>titles only>integration
This is good place to start reading:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/adding-to-your-flock
 

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