My 20 week chickens keep fighting the 2 older NEW chickens..:(

[NaturalCharm81]

I am new to chicken keeping as of May2011. I raised 5 Americanas from day old peeps. About 2 weeks ago I went to pick up a rhode island red and a barred rock that is about a month older than my 5 Americanas....Long story short the original chicks got past the barrier I had setup (i guess not very well) and they beat up the barred rock, while the rhode island red was trying to defend her (How do I know that..when I came in to check on them again the rhode island red was still kicking tailfeathers). Both her eyes were shut and I originally thought they had pecked them out. I did some research online and found that most posts i read said to pat/softly clean her face/eyes and put some neosporin on her eyelids....So I did and her eyes opened up, and i could see all the damage done on her face. Now my question is should I make the 2 new ones a seperate coop or pen??

 

[navasima]

Sorry it's under these circumstances! You are going to need to integrate slowly. Seperate the new girls right away and treat the wounds. If you can make a space for them where all the girls can see/hear each other, but not get to each other to fight. If you look up integrating, there are a lot of threads on that topic where people describe the methods they use in detail. When you set up a barrier - think of rival gangs in a turf war.....cause that's what you've got!

It's going to be a while bafore the established flock considers letting strangers onto their turf. When they do (finally) come together...then they need to establish the pecking order. Yep! ...more fun ahead!

Don't be discouraged though - just take a deep breath and be patient.......

 

[Johnn]

i think you should. i love it when hens protect each other once one of my hens was ill and it came up and a new one started beating her up and my hens at the top of the pecking order stepped in and beat the new one up that was getting my ill one (sadly the ill hen died

)

 

[NaturalCharm81]

Thanks for the help you guys!!!... I had them all in a temporary (garage, while I worked on fixing the main coop i made them. I went on and let the 5 easter eggers go back into the main coop while the new 2 are in the temporary one. Does it matter that they can't see each other right now, since they have to integrate slowly...that is when I barricade their section off in the main coop. Will they forget each other or pick up where they left off...sigh the chicks so hostile (lol)