- Jul 23, 2010
- 14
- 0
- 22
Hey everyone,
I'm new on here, but I've used this wonderful forum as a go-to source for many questions in the past so hopefully someone on here can answer my question and/or put my mind at ease about the situation in my backyard right now...
We have a small backyard flock which, until yesterday, consisted of 3 Barred Rock chicks about 7 weeks old. We'd ordered them through a source online and after we found a home for the extra chickens and had decided on our 3 "hens", one of them ended up being a rooster. Of course, just my luck. Well the farmer we'd given our extra 8 chicks to a few weeks ago (3 hens and 5 roosters...we had no idea they shipped a bunch of males for "warmth") was really nice and told us that if one of the supposed hens turned out to be a rooster he'd gladly swap us and we could have one of our original hens back. All this exchanging had been done through a friend whose family lives in this small town about 45 minutes from where I live, so I've had very minimal involvement in the actual swapping and whatnot.
Well, yesterday was the day to send our rooster (Stevie Wonder) to the farm with the prospect of getting one of our hens back, thus completing the quaint little flock in our backyard. Well, my friend returned with the same carrier we sent her off with the rooster in and Low and Behold...an Ameraucana hen. Older than our 7 week girls. Farmer said she's not quite old enough to lay yet, but will certainly be laying before winter. If I had to guess I'd say she's probably about....a month or maybe even a month and a half older than our chicks. I'm not very familiar with the breed, as I've only ever had Barred Rock (and LOVED THEM) and one Rock Island way back when, so I'm not entirely sure about her age. I should try to get a picture on here...
Anyways, we introduced her to the other 2 and there was much pandemonium. She was pacing and clucking all back and forth in the run. jumping around and generally not being a happy camper. Well then, one of our little girls (Lucy) started going at her and pecking at her! The smaller girl going after the big girl! I know I've read things about if there's no rooster sometimes a hen will take charge as a "dominant" one of the flock, and I'm hoping it's just a way of them creating a "pecking order" within the flock. Later that night I went out to the coop to peek in and see how everyone was getting along, the 2 Barred girls were sitting on their roost and the Ameraucana was no where to be found in the coop...she was sitting in a corner of the run.
This morning I let out the 2 barred girls (like I always do) and decided to keep the Ameraucana in the coop/run to herself so she could have a chance to get accustomed to it without the other 2 around. And not only that, because she's bigger she could easily jump out of our yard, the other 2 are still small enough where they don't...or haven't tried hard enough yet. Well, I've been looking out in the yard every so often this morning and it seems as though the Ameraucana (Dolores, I guess I can attach a name to her since I have the other ones) is just staying in the run. As if she's scared or has been banned from the coop by the other 2 from the previous night?
Should I just keep the newbie to herself in the coop/run area to try to make her feel comfortable? I don't want to stress her out much more than I'm sure she already is. Please, tell me they'll all get along eventually. I really wish we would've just gotten one of our previous hens of the same age and breed back!!
I'm new on here, but I've used this wonderful forum as a go-to source for many questions in the past so hopefully someone on here can answer my question and/or put my mind at ease about the situation in my backyard right now...
We have a small backyard flock which, until yesterday, consisted of 3 Barred Rock chicks about 7 weeks old. We'd ordered them through a source online and after we found a home for the extra chickens and had decided on our 3 "hens", one of them ended up being a rooster. Of course, just my luck. Well the farmer we'd given our extra 8 chicks to a few weeks ago (3 hens and 5 roosters...we had no idea they shipped a bunch of males for "warmth") was really nice and told us that if one of the supposed hens turned out to be a rooster he'd gladly swap us and we could have one of our original hens back. All this exchanging had been done through a friend whose family lives in this small town about 45 minutes from where I live, so I've had very minimal involvement in the actual swapping and whatnot.
Well, yesterday was the day to send our rooster (Stevie Wonder) to the farm with the prospect of getting one of our hens back, thus completing the quaint little flock in our backyard. Well, my friend returned with the same carrier we sent her off with the rooster in and Low and Behold...an Ameraucana hen. Older than our 7 week girls. Farmer said she's not quite old enough to lay yet, but will certainly be laying before winter. If I had to guess I'd say she's probably about....a month or maybe even a month and a half older than our chicks. I'm not very familiar with the breed, as I've only ever had Barred Rock (and LOVED THEM) and one Rock Island way back when, so I'm not entirely sure about her age. I should try to get a picture on here...
Anyways, we introduced her to the other 2 and there was much pandemonium. She was pacing and clucking all back and forth in the run. jumping around and generally not being a happy camper. Well then, one of our little girls (Lucy) started going at her and pecking at her! The smaller girl going after the big girl! I know I've read things about if there's no rooster sometimes a hen will take charge as a "dominant" one of the flock, and I'm hoping it's just a way of them creating a "pecking order" within the flock. Later that night I went out to the coop to peek in and see how everyone was getting along, the 2 Barred girls were sitting on their roost and the Ameraucana was no where to be found in the coop...she was sitting in a corner of the run.
This morning I let out the 2 barred girls (like I always do) and decided to keep the Ameraucana in the coop/run to herself so she could have a chance to get accustomed to it without the other 2 around. And not only that, because she's bigger she could easily jump out of our yard, the other 2 are still small enough where they don't...or haven't tried hard enough yet. Well, I've been looking out in the yard every so often this morning and it seems as though the Ameraucana (Dolores, I guess I can attach a name to her since I have the other ones) is just staying in the run. As if she's scared or has been banned from the coop by the other 2 from the previous night?
Should I just keep the newbie to herself in the coop/run area to try to make her feel comfortable? I don't want to stress her out much more than I'm sure she already is. Please, tell me they'll all get along eventually. I really wish we would've just gotten one of our previous hens of the same age and breed back!!