New Additions - Questions about integrating

[Spaeth-chicks]

Last year we hatched eggs from a friends chickens. Our flock consists of 4 hens and 1 rooster. We LOVE our chickens, and really wanted to add some more girls to our flock. We wanted to hatch their eggs so bad. So we did…we ended up with 1 girl and 4 boys…eek! I found homes for the boys, unfortunately I didn’t realize it was going to be SOOOO hard to integrate the single little girl into the flock. It’s been so rough…they are ok spending the day around her foraging in their yard, but if we try to put her in their coop run at dusk they just WON’T allow it. Sooo I thought that it might be too stressful and dangerous for her, and today I had two suuuuuuper adorable pullets delivered from a local farm. They are a couple to a few weeks younger than our little singleton (Zayda). She’s pecking at them and being a little bit of a bully, but it’s not constant. Zayda is 11 weeks old now and the newbies are 8-10 weeks…I’m Guessing the Speckled Sussex (Horus) is closer to 10 weeks, and the little Polish (Gwendolyn) is probably 8 weeks…she’s tiny. I know the pecking is probably normal, since they don’t know each other yet, but this will hopefully chill out right? I just hope they can form their own little possy then once I try to integrate them with the elders they’ll have more confidence in numbers…am I doing this right? I’ve attached pics just cause they’re sooooo cute! I needed to share.

 

[JaeG]

They are adorable. As long as Zayda isn't bullying to the point of injuring the newbies then things should settle down and hopefully they'll form their own little flock soon. Multiple dishes of food, and a few waterers is probably a good idea initially so that Zayda can't prevent either of her new friends from accessing food and water if you have them constantly together.

 

[Mrs. K]

Also splitting up the older birds flock can sometimes really help. Often times, there are meanies, and followers. If you pull 3 birds, and leave two adult birds with the chicks, putting the meanies where you have the chicks.

When you get the group of the bigs and littles going along, then add back in the other adults. Should work.

 

[Spaeth-chicks]

They are adorable. As long as Zayda isn't bullying to the point of injuring the newbies then things should settle down and hopefully they'll form their own little flock soon. Multiple dishes of food, and a few waterers is probably a good idea initially so that Zayda can't prevent either of her new friends from accessing food and water if you have them constantly together.

Thank you! That’s reassuring! She’s not consistently bullying them, and she’s not hurting them I don’t think. She’s just pecking them on the head and chasing them a bit from time to time. They’re nervous around her too. I guess it’s normal. She doesn’t know them, and they don’t know her. She seems to let them eat and drink water. I’ll add more feeders and waterers if that changes. That’s a good idea.

 

[Spaeth-chicks]

Also splitting up the older birds flock can sometimes really help. Often times, there are meanies, and followers. If you pull 3 birds, and leave two adult birds with the chicks, putting the meanies where you have the chicks.

When you get the group of the bigs and littles going along, then add back in the other adults. Should work.

That’s interesting. I think I might try that after the littles get situated and bond a bit.