Is it safe to introduce new chicks?

[Christinacgraham]

I have one 3 week, almost 4 week old chick right now that was the only one who hatched from the incubator. He is very close with us but we qant him to socialize properly so we are getting a few more from a store that are also 3 to 4 weeks old. Is it dangerous to introduce new chicks to him for behavior or health reasons? Could he get a disease from the new ones?

 

[JacinLarkwell]

I have one 3 week, almost 4 week old chick right now that was the only one who hatched from the incubator. He is very close with us but we qant him to socialize properly so we are getting a few more from a store that are also 3 to 4 weeks old. Is it dangerous to introduce new chicks to him for behavior or health reasons? Could he get a disease from the new ones?

He could get sick. Hence why it's a good idea to properly quarantine new arrivals

 

[Christinacgraham]

He could get sick. Hence why it's a good idea to properly quarantine new arrivals

How long/how should I quaruntine him from the new one?

 

[JacinLarkwell]

How long/how should I quaruntine him from the new one?

30 days of complete separation (different air space, different outfits when caring for them than when you're caring for your current one)

Anything else still allows for cross contamination, in which case they're basically not quarantined

 

[NatJ]

I would just put the new chicks in with the current chick.

Is it dangerous to introduce new chicks to him for behavior or health reasons? Could he get a disease from the new ones?

Yes, he could get a disease from the new chicks if they have any diseases.

For behavior reasons, it would be much easier to introduce new chicks now instead of letting them get older. The younger they are, the more easily they accept new flock members.

If you decide to quarantine new chicks, that means your current chick must live separately for another month. During that time, the new chicks might still get sick, which would mean you either treat them or cull them.

If you do not quarantine new chicks, the worst possibility is that the new ones AND the current chick could get sick with something (and depending on what it is, it might not be treatable.)

Quarantine is a great precaution if you have a large flock, or a flock that is very valuable to you, and you need to introduce new chickens. But it is a lot of bother, and difficult to keep them separate enough to make much difference. (Diseases can spread through the air, or on chicken dander that blows in the wind, or carried on your clothing.)

When you only have a single chick like this, I would skip quarantine and just put the new chicks in with him. If they have a treatable disease, you will have to treat just one more bird (current chick.) If they have an untreatable disease, you will feel awful either way, because you will become attached to the new chicks before you learn whether they actually have such a disease.

we are getting a few more from a store that are also 3 to 4 weeks old.

Any chicks might have diseases, but ones that have spent their time in a store are probably safer than ones that run around outdoors with adult chickens. The ones in the store have been exposed to fewer things.