mixing bantam and regular chicks

[bakerjw]

This last weekend I went to see a guy about some Silver Sebright chicks after I saw pictures of adult birds and fell in love with them. They are beautiful birds. Anyway I had picked up nine 1 to 2 week old chicks from him and he took me on a tour of his farm. It is right along the Bays mountain chain here in NE Tennessee and a gorgeous place. Anyway he was a typical good ole boy farmer with a hodge podge of coups and pens all over the place. When he took me into his hatchery where he incubates eggs he had a large brood of Sebrights and many little fuzzy yellow white leghorns. Well I hadn't done a lot of research on the SS breed as it was a knee jerk whim purchase so my only disappointment was that they were a bantam chicken and I was wanting to get some birds to build up a flock for meat purposes. I ended up giving back 4 of the SS and getting 5 of the WL chicks from him which brings me to my question.

They are now all in the brooder together and I am noticing that the SS chicks like to push around the WL chicks. I suspect that here in a week or so the WL will exceed the SS in size but right now there sometimes tends to be some typical chicken politics.

Has anyone ever ran into problems mixing 1 to 2 week old bantams with 0 to 1 week old regular sized chicks?

 

[SarahFair]

I hatched out silkies with reg sized chicks and never had a problem.
The smaller ones will probly avoid the larger ones in time...


If they start REALLY beating them up then I would remove the smaller ones, but IMO there is going to be some pecking order going on

 

[BriteChicken]

I mixed 4 week banty's and 1 week Standards and now the Bantams are half the size of the Standards but they seem to be holding their own... that's just my experience though.

P.S. I also have a second brooder with 5 4 week Bantam and 4 week old standards doing great there too! DARN fuzzy chick math Lol! I'm only supposed to keep 6.

 

[Lotsapaints]

I have Silkies in with Delawares and Partridge Rocks and Midget White turkeys the Silkies sleep with the turkeys who woulda thunk that..... I have 48 birds in a 6 ft waterer (round) that I use to brood 3-1 gallon waters and 3 feeders-2 are 18 inches and one is a round 11 pound feeder and I make sure the Silkies can reach everything they are the youngest too. I'm moving the turkeys out next weekend to their own house and brooder but they all get along just great.

 

[Jx2inNC]

Mine all pile together when they sleep.
It appears they do great together.
In fact, I'm betting when one of the banty roosters gets bigger it might show some of the others who's boss.

 

[hkwdesign]

I put my 4 week old bantams in with new chicks after a week of separate brooders, and all has been wonderful! The bantams are much bigger and act as mother hens to the babies (now 2 weeks old) It's very sweet - wondering if it will keep up over time as the standards get bigger!