Need help! One chick died, how to introduce 1 more.

[hmillie]

Hello everyone. Here is my situation, I have a small backyard flock of 3 hens. I picked up 3 day old chicks on Saturday, but 1 died last night . My concern is if anything happens to either of the other two, then I will only have one chick to introduce to my existing flock and that seems unfair to the newbie. The breeder said I can come get a new chick from them (from the same hatching, they have a few left) but they said to be cautious of introducing just 1 chick to the other 2 chicks even though they are all the same age (about 6 days old.) Has anyone done this or similar. Any advice would be very appreciated.

 

[SunHwaKwon]

I introduce new chicks up to 3 weeks age difference with no problem. Even at three weeks I don't have issues other than the older ones being faster and careless about stepping on the younger ones. I don't think you will have an issue at all, at 6 days old. Just keep an eye on them. Even better if you put them together at night while they're sleeping.

 

[donrae]

At this age, just put them together. They're still figuring out how to live, they're not heavily invested in a social structure yet.