Merging my flock

[blondiebee181]

That's a good question. I never fed medicated so I didn't think about that. Adults are fine eating chick food, the biggest difference is chick food is higher in protein. As far as I know, the medication won't hurt older birds but hopefully someone will chime in with a more concrete answer. The other question is if any of your 18 week olds are laying? If any of them are, and you offer chick food to everyone, be sure you put out a dish of oyster shell for any layers. Chicks and non layers won't eat it and layers will take what they need.

 

[cluckermomofsix]

Actually, my older ones are 18 months old, not 18 weeks, so all are laying (except for my ornamental breed!). A couple of the older ones are just starting to molt for the first time so the additional protein may be good for them (read that on one of the sponsored articles on this site). I will probably just do a mixture of chick feed and layer pellets so that all feeders have the same offering and there's no fighting over the "good stuff"!

I will put out some oyster shell, as you suggest.

I put the younger ones in the coop last night with the older ones for the first time...they didn't like it at first but the older ones did leave them alone, just as you said they would. They were peeping quite a bit so I put a night light in there and that seemed to really help...I chose to use one of those battery operated candles with a timer, that are available now. It shut itself off after four hours and, by then, everyone was fast asleep. I am very cautious now about putting anything electrical near the coop...my neighbor's coop caught on fire (heat lamp) just two nights ago and all eight hens perished in the fire.

Thanks so much for your help!!!

 

[whittychick]

Sounds like it'll be a smooth transition! And that you're doing everything right! Personally I've read to never heat a coop because once power is off your birds will be dead within hours. But that's just what I've read! They're hardly little birdies! So sad about your neighbor :-( good luck and hope all your girls get along!

 

[whittychick]

To cluckermomofsix, yeah I agree...at night they are the least likely to pick on each other because it is "sleeptime" just be sure you have plenty of perch room in your coop, because cramped perches can still cause discomfort. You may have to round up the newbies at night for a bit and put them in the coop with the elders. I have a new chick that I recently integrated with mine and it tries to sleep on the roof instead of in with the big girls so I have to go out and put it in when I do my nightly headcount. After a while things should iron out and a pecking order will re-establish, but that brings me to my answer for whittychick...the pecking order will get established, but it will always be enforced from top chicken all the way to bottom. Top hens will always pick on lower hens when it coms to food, water, scratch spots, dustbathing pits etc. usually once the order is there, there won't be much "fighting" per se, but the top hen will come up to one lower than her that is at the feed dish and maybe rap her smartly on the head with her beak, letting her know to back off and let the top hen eat first. With a couple of my girls, all the top hen has to do is "glare" at the bottom hen and she knows to back off...sometimes she'll even growl, lol but any actual fighting should subside.

Thank you for answering my question! The pecking is hardly happening at this point which I love!

 

[blondiebee181]

Actually, my older ones are 18 months old, not 18 weeks, so all are laying (except for my ornamental breed!). A couple of the older ones are just starting to molt for the first time so the additional protein may be good for them (read that on one of the sponsored articles on this site). I will probably just do a mixture of chick feed and layer pellets so that all feeders have the same offering and there's no fighting over the "good stuff"!

I will put out some oyster shell, as you suggest.

I put the younger ones in the coop last night with the older ones for the first time...they didn't like it at first but the older ones did leave them alone, just as you said they would. They were peeping quite a bit so I put a night light in there and that seemed to really help...I chose to use one of those battery operated candles with a timer, that are available now. It shut itself off after four hours and, by then, everyone was fast asleep. I am very cautious now about putting anything electrical near the coop...my neighbor's coop caught on fire (heat lamp) just two nights ago and all eight hens perished in the fire.

Thanks so much for your help!!!

Aw, so sad about your neighbors fire....yeah you have to so, so careful...the small battery power sounds good, but I have read similar things about heat that whittychick has. Chickens are extremely hardy birds and as long as you keep their coop dry and well insulated they should not need additional heat. Also assuming you have a good bird to coop space ratio. You will read several arguments (sometimes quite heated....haha get it?) about whether to heat and light or not to...everyone is going to make their own decision but I do neither. I feel it is natural for the girls to take a few months off in the winter should they wish to. Furthermore, our winter here in Idaho got in the negative teens last winter and the girls did fine. I have heard plenty of Canadian girls who get even colder do just fine too as long as their owners have taken the necessary measures to keep the coop insulated, draft-free, and moisture-free. Sorry don't mean to hi-jack this thread.

Also, I would not offer layer at all to young chicks...excess calcium is hard on their systems. I would just offer chick starter to all if that's what you need to do and put out the oyster shell. The hens will still get plenty of calcium that way.