New Coop 'In', old coop out!

[enggass]

Hey all,
I have a new coop I built that I am just about ready to move my 12-16 week old birds into.
What is the best way to do this? Obviously, If I close or remove the old coop with the new coop open, I doubt they will go in on their own.
Is the best thing for me to do is to manually place each bird into the new coop and then leave them in there for a day or 2 to send the message this is now home?
What would you do?
Thanks.

 

[ChestnutRidge]

I just had the same situation, and that's what I did. I was advised that I could take a few per trip, I guess using boxes or something, but I only had 11 to move and it was less than 60 feet. If you had many birds, you could put several in a carrying crate of some sort for each trip. I went in just after dusk, my DH holding a flashlight, and picked them one by one from the roost, carried them over, and set them on the new roost. I have little solar shed lights in the coops: I left the old coop's light off and put on the new coop's light for a while because I wanted them to be able to see that the new coop was safe. I left it on about 20 minutes (it's pretty dim) and then went up and turned it off. I left them inside for a day and a half and let them out on the evening of the second day for a few hours. ETA: I left the old coop and the door to the old run closed, so they haven't been back in, and now it is occupied by the next group of chicks.

Now, I hadn't built my run yet, so I had 2 ladies stay out overnight sitting in a tree above their old coop. My mistake, but they were okay. The next day I strung up a temporary run with deer netting so that they could master the habit of coming out in the morning and returning to the new coop. They've been fine since.

Good luck!

 

[mommyofthreewithchicks]

When I am moving chickens I try to do it at night and then keep them in their new space for a few days before free ranging.