Introducing Chickens

Kim Leach

In the Brooder
Jul 29, 2017
3
3
14
I bought my first 12 Rhode Island Red Pullets, 1 Buff Brahma and 1 Standard Partridge Cochin in June. 1.5 weeks later I picked up my second batch of RIRs this time I got 12 pullets and 2 roosters. All is going well my first batch is now 7 weeks and the second is 5 week. This evening my stupid dog broke through the wire and killed 10 of my chickens.
I am hoping to replace them and I found a supplier were I can get some 16 week Rhode Island Reds and possibly some speckled Sussex. Can I integrate the older hens with my younger chickens?
 
SO sorry to hear about your loss. I would definitely put the new birds in quarantine and not combine until you are certain they do not have any sort of problem to pass on to your surviving birds. I always do a quarantine and then if the birds are not too much different in size, combine. I combine the birds in the evening when they are sleeping and dark out so they can wake up to start the "pecking" order among the hens. If you notice too much actual fighting and it gets bloody, I take the biggest instigators of the fight out of the pen and put them in a time out (dog crate, large cage) for a few days.

Good luck! There is a lot of information on combining flocks, but most success depends on how your personal flock reacts.

Great link for this information: https://www.backyardchickens.com/articles/adding-to-your-flock.47756/
 
Last edited:
That had to be hard, seeing what your dog did. :hugs

5, 7, and 16 weeks of age. Many of us integrate younger chickens like that a lot but we all have different set-ups and conditions. I always have adults in the flock when I do that. My chicks are also raised with the flock, either in my brooder in the coop or by a broody hen that protects them. They grow up with the flock. And I have a lot of room, much more than the 4 square feet in the coop and 10 square feet in the run you keep reading about. I think extra space is the most important thing you can have to make integration easier.

In my current flock I have my adults, some 25-week-old brooder-raised pullets that are now laying that I integrated with the adults at 5 weeks of age, some 16-week-olds raised with the others by a broody hen and weaned at 3 weeks of age, and some 9-week-olds raised with all of the others and weaned by the broody hen at 4 weeks of age. I'm going through this to show you can integrate them that young.

I don't know how much room you have or how it is laid out. I'm assuming the 5 and 7 week olds are already integrated with each other. My suggestion is to house them side by side with the older ones for at least a week, maybe a bit longer. They need to be able to see each other but not be able to attack each other. Some chickens (not all) will attack strangers to protect their territory. By housing them side by side they at least learn to accept that the other chickens have a right to be there. That doesn't solve all of the problems but it helps quite a bit.

Older chickens outrank more immature chickens in the pecking order and can be fairly vicious in enforcing those pecking order rights. Usually this is not a problem unless the younger chicken invades the personal space of the older. Then the younger chicken is likely to get a peck. If it runs away life is usually good, the proper order has been restored. But if the weaker does not run away that is perceived as a challenge so the older keeps attacking. That's why plenty of room is important, they need enough room to run away and get away. Plus they need room to avoid the older so they don't invade their personal space. Some chickens are just brutes and bullies and will go out of their way to attack weaker chickens but a lot are not. There is some luck involved with which ones you have.

That needed room just is not a matter of square feet per chicken but has more to do with the quality of that room. The more room the better of course, but can the weaker get out of the line of sight of the older? Having access to both the coop and run instead of being in just one of them helps. Having places to hide behind or under can help, just don't create traps where the chicken can't get away if attacked. Vertical separation can help too. In the morning I often see my younger chickens on the roosts when the older are on the coop floor. During the gay the younger maybe in the coop when the older are outside. The younger are avoiding the older.

I find that having separate feeding and watering stations helps. That way the weaker don't have to challenge the older to eat and drink. It cuts down on potential conflict. The older can be bullies about keeping the younger away from the food and water.

Something I don't do but others do is to provide a safe haven. With your ages you should be able to manage. Have two separate areas with holes in between that the younger can get through but the older can't. That way the younger can mingle with the older when they want to or they can avoid them or get away if attacked. That's another way to increase the quality of your space. I don't know what size those holes might be for your ages since I don't do it.

I know I make integration sound horrible and lots of work. Most of the time it goes pretty well, even if you don't do all I recommend. Some of it is how much room you have but a lot depends on the personality of your individual chickens. Some are just brutes and bullies and make your life harder. A lot are a lot more laid back and accepting. A lot of people would be surprised at how much my very young chicks leave the protection of the broody and mingle with the other adults. Occasionally they get pecked when they invade the personal space of an adult hen but a lot of the time they don't.

When you do integrate them I suggest you try it on a morning where you can be around to watch. See how it goes. They will probably want to return to separate places to sleep, Great, let them. Don't try to force them to be together. After they have spend about a month peacefully spending the days together you can try moving them into the same coop at night. Mine are most brutal to each other as they settle in to sleep at night and they are in a coop where they may be limited in running away and avoiding. When I do put the chicks in the main coop with the older ones I'm down there at the break of day to let them out until I'm comfortable there aren't issues. Practically every time that's only one or two mornings. With them spending that much time together outside and with my large coop it's just not an issue.

Sometimes integration goes so smoothly you wonder what all the concern was about, but occasionally a chicken can die. What normally happens is that the chicks quickly learn that they should not invade the personal space of an older chicken and avoid them. The sort of spend most of their time in a sub-flock, hanging around but staying away from the older chickens. There can be some violence but as long as they can run away it usually does not end badly. That's the older teaching proper chicken etiquette to the younger.
 
Welcome to BYC!
Adding older birds is a risk for bringing pests and disease into your flock of chicks.
Horrible to have lost so many to your own dog! But do you really need to replace them?
Knowing more about your goals, location/climate(put it in your profile),
and coop/run(dimensions and pics) might help garner more specific advice.

Are all your pullets and cockerels living in the same enclosure?
Adding larger older birds could be tricky....hope you have lots of space!

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:

Consider biological/medical quarantine:
BYC Medical Quarantine Article
BYC 'quarantine' search

Integration Basics:
It's all about territory and resources(space/food/water).
Existing birds will almost always attack new ones to defend their resources.
Understanding chicken behaviors is essential to integrating new birds into your flock.

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.

In adjacent runs, spread scratch grains along the dividing mesh, best if mesh is just big enough for birds to stick their head thru, so they get used to eating together.

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 copious blood drawn and/or new bird is not trapped/pinned down and beaten unmercilessly, 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'(but not a dead end trap) and/or up and away from any bully birds. Roosts, pallets or boards leaned up against walls or up on concrete blocks, old chairs tables, branches, logs, stumps out in the run can really help. Lots of diversion and places to 'hide' instead of bare wide open run.


This used to be a better search, new format has reduced it's efficacy, but still:
Read up on integration..... BYC advanced search>titles only>integration
This is good place to start reading, BUT some info is outdated IMO:
http://www.backyardchickens.com/a/adding-to-your-flock
 
Hi all thanks for your help! I ended up just getting 11 more 5 week olds and only 3 larger hens. I left the larger hens in the "dog crate" in the coop and everyone seemed fine but my new 5 week olds are much smaller than my original 5 week ones so I put them in the crate instead to let them grow a bit before I release them.
 

New posts New threads Active threads

Back
Top Bottom