New chicken! How to socialize?

[chickiyo]

So we lost one of our two chickens to a racoon attack on Saturday. Our lovely Bo was gone and our other chicken, a Buff Orpington named Ponyo was very distraught and clucking for her everywhere. Today we just bought a new chicken, a Rhode Island Red which we have named Akaky. And we are going to introduce her to our chicken tommorow.

The new chicken is not very friendly, she clucks very loudly if we pet her or hold her and I want her to get used to being held and petted as we have alot of kids from the neighborhood who love to pet our chickens. Is there anyway I can get her to be more comfortable with human handling?

Also we are not so sure if Akaky will hit it off with our other chicken. Is there any way in which I can get the two to get along if Akaky decides to hate Ponyo. (Ponyo is the most mild mannered chicken ever and we were told Akaky may be feisty with her)

Never had a RIR before so I would love some advice from people who own these birds.

Thanks,

Summer

 

[gryeyes]

Well, first, you should quarantine Akaky before introduction to your flock (no matter how small it's gotten).

Then, what I do with a single chicken to introduce, I put her in a grow-out coop and temporary pen for two weeks. A dog house with a chicken wire fence held up by garden stakes inside your run will do. She gets her own feed and water, and the flock gets to see, hear, and check her out through the temporary fence. After two weeks, I take down the temp fence and let them mingle. By then, they know each other and they're not "strangers" any more. Pecking order issues are far less dramatic then.

Good luck!

As to socializing her to people, just work on it. Treats always help.

 

[elmo]

The previous post has excellent advice for introducing a new chicken to a flock, but your "flock" has only one chicken. I suspect that both birds will be so delighted just not to be alone that they'll take to each other pretty quickly.

The advice about the quarantine still applies, though.

By the way, did you figure out how the raccoon got to your other chicken? Sorry about your loss.

 

[chickiyo]

Thanks for the advice!

The racoon broke into our coop,so we are getting a new one. Its a horrible business, I just shudder when I think of how scared my poor baby chicken was!Thats what really gets to me.