My husband is afraid it will fall out of the layer box and be killed by the big hens/roos. Should we take it/them out?
Do not seperate the mom. As a mamma chicken she will protect them with all her might. She might stay in the nest for three whole days before bringing her chicks out to eat and drink. Also if you take the chicks away this can mentally destroy the hen, she sat on them for a long time and was rewarded with babies.
How high off the ground is the chick?? If more than 6"-12", yes move them asap. My feed is hanging a foot of the ground so I provided feed at a lower level for my chicks, but mom wouldn't eat out of that, only the hanging feeder, and so chicks followed suit and at 4 days old they were hopping on the feeder to help themselves which was really adorable. I also didn't consider how high on the pecking order the hen is. Most of the time, mama looks out for her babies and it's rare for other chickens to bother them. Even in my immensely over-crowded coop, the rooster and older hens left babies alone, but the mom is top dog on the pecking order. If the mom is low on the pecking order, that situation could have been different.
AWE!!!
If you feel stressed out about how they might fall, then you can put a piece of fabric draped on the opening of the nesting box. I put pieces of old fabric on my nesting box enterances and the chicks seem to believe that it is a wall at first.
