Lone chicken - looking for solutions

[IOT]

This is my first time posting here. I'm excited to be part of this community!

This is also my first time raising chickens. I got my first order of chicks four weeks ago and unfortunately only one of them made it alive. I was able to "foster" a chicken from a friend to keep my lone chicken company. They get along very well and they are now 4 and 6 weeks old. Unfortunately, the time has come when I have to return the 6-week old and my 4-week old chick would be alone again. I have a few days-old chicks that were just delivered yesterday, but my lone chick is too big to be with them, and I'm assuming I'd need to wait quite a while to introduce the lone chick to the babies?

My friend has offered me another chick of the same breed as the 6-week old I'm now fostering (at this point I wanted to keep the chicken I fostered but that option does not seem available) but about 3-weeks old, and which I would be able to keep. Would these two chicks be able to bond if introduce them to to each other now? would it be best to wait as long as possible to separate the ones I currently have, or would it be better to make the transition sooner? Would it help to home the three of them together for a bit to facilitate the transition, or would that not help because the new one might be excluded? I'm assuming that separating the two of them now and keeping my lone chick alone for some time until the days-old chick are old enough is not an option?

Any help will be appreciated! Thanks in advance!

 

[InterestingChickens]

If you can't keep the chick that you're fostering, i'd say it would be okay if you fostered the 3 week old chick and just bonded them now. Just watch them for a while and make sure they get along okay with each other.

 

[IOT]

Thanks!

Would it be better to have the three of them together for a while, or to just switch them out without an overlap? and would you advise to do this sooner or later?

Now, would it be a terrible idea to wait one more week to separate and then have the lone chick wait alone until the babies are older and I can have all of them together? How long would that need to be? I don't necessarily want to get a new chicken (the foster chick would have been an unplanned addition to my flock, and a reasonable one now that my chick has bonded with it), but I'm assuming it would be quite stressful for my chick to be alone, so I'm willing to do it if it's the best or only option for it.

 

[Jeanw]

Welcome, and all the best for your little chicks!

 

[InterestingChickens]

Maybe try to do the switch at the same time. So then your chicken won't have time to feel lonely. The sooner you can do it the better, because you just don't want them to establish a real relationship with each other. Would you say they have already? Because then it's best that you don't separate them from each other.

 

[NatJ]

You could house your one chick next to the baby chicks. Maybe divide them with a piece of hardware cloth, so they can see and hear each other, and start becoming acquainted.

Depending on how many little chicks, you can probably remove the divider pretty soon. (Maybe a week from now.) Yes, the one is quite a bit older--but it would also be the only one of that size. So it doesn't have any buddies to gang up on the little ones.

Make sure the space is big enough that one end is warm enough for the babies, and the other end is cool enough for the big one. (In practice, they will all move around to all the temperature zones--they just need to have the right options.)

If you decide to return the foster chick and get the younger one instead--I would just do the switch one day.

But personally, I would try to combine the one chick with the babies. In just a few weeks, the age difference will not seem so big, because of how fast chicks grow.

 

[IOT]

Yes, I think they have a relationship with each other already, which is why I wanted just to keep the foster one. My interpretation is that my chick sees the foster one as a mother, since it's bigger and older (by two weeks), they cuddle together and my chick is always following the foster chick around. That's why I'm worried about separating them. Like I said, I can get her another chick for company, but it will be younger that my currently fostered one, so not sure if it'll be a good replacement anyway.

 

[InterestingChickens]

Yes, I think they have a relationship with each other already, which is why I wanted just to keep the foster one. My interpretation is that my chick sees the foster one as a mother, since it's bigger and older (by two weeks), they cuddle together and my chick is always following the foster chick around. That's why I'm worried about separating them. Like I said, I can get her another chick for company, but it will be younger that my currently fostered one, so not sure if it'll be a good replacement anyway.

Try taking the older chick out for a bit and see how the other one reacts.

 

[IOT]

Try taking the older chick out for a bit and see how the other one reacts.

I have, because I've been giving them time on the outside coop and I take one out at a time. They both start freaking out and calling out the minute the other one is out of view.

 

[InterestingChickens]

They obviously love each other. Hard to separate them now.