Quarantine Advice

[MLWoods]

I have read, the awesome article here on introducing new birds to the flock. I have a small yard, we live in the city. At first I was planing the quarantine in a sectioned off area of our pretty large enclosed run. Then I figured that would be a bad idea since I would have to walk thru the run (and thru the part that my current chickens occupy) after taking care of the new chickens. This lead me to decide on fencing off a smaller piece of what is left of our yard outside the run. The chickens would be sharing a hardware cloth fence on one side, but that would be the extent of the shared space. They would definatly kbe breathing the same air at times, and seeing each other, but they could not get to each other. I could actually block a few feet of the run away from my current girls, creating sort of a dead space between everyone. Does this sound adequate?
Currently I have 6 girls, hatched last August, 5 are laying. I am adding a bantam rooster to try and keep the invading squirrels out of the run and coop. The farm I am buying from has several mixed breed pullets (about 5 weeks old) so I thought maybe one or two of those to hang with the banty in quarantine since they are all coming from the same place.
LASTLY (I swear) we have to go out of town about 4 days after the 30 day quarantine, should that be enough time to make sure everyone has found their place in the flock, and my neighbor won't find dead hen pecked chickens??
THANK YOU for reading all this mess, and for whatever wisdom you can imaprt!
Lauren

 

[ChickensRDinos]

Is it just the one rooster that you are adding? I also have a small, city yard. When I introduce new birds I am generally only doing 2 at a time. I have never had a rooster so I don't know how behaviorally different that is but I generally keep the new birds in a large coated wire dog crate for the first week to make sure they are healthy and treat for mites or anything else they brought with them. I store them in my garage at night and move them outside in the day.

After one week (and a clean bill of health) I move the dog crate into my coop during the day for an additional week. I believe people call this the "play pen" method of introduction but it allows them to get used to each other without being able to actually get to each other. After that second week of hang time, I let them out and hope for the best.

Good luck!!

 

[MLWoods]

Yep, just the one bantam roo, and one or two pullets. I know the lady I am buying him from, and he no louder than a hen after she lays an egg. I don't want a full size roo around my little ones, and my neighbors would surely hate me! A banty is bigger than our little tree rats, so I am hoping this will be the trick!

 

[Mrs. K]

well, this is not the advice I would give if you were a big operator. But really you are not quarantining if they are close together, and I you are not going to do it right, you may as well not bother with all the pen dividing.

You don't say how old the roo is, and a banty is smaller than a standard hen, but if he is 5 months old or more, I think I would just add him at night. There may be some squabbling, but let them work it out, unless something is really being killed

MrsK

 

[MLWoods]

Mrs. K,
The bantam roo is about 12 weeks old. We have decided to wait to get any new chickens until we are home from being out of town. By then the banty will be 17 weeks, and the mixed breed pullets 9. If all my ideas on separating the new from the old are inadequate, can you make a constructive suggestion that would afford me a little protection? My property is .15 acres, there can't be that much of an airspace separation, but I can physically separate the birds, can you suggest a minimum distance.
Also, once the separation is over, can my birds go back to the area of the backyard/sideyard (occasionally we let them run around in the general backyard) that I assigned as the "quarantine" space for the new birds?
I am a first time chicken owner, and we live in the city, so constructive advice is gladly accepted. Below (if I did this right) are pictures of our run space. Where I initially thought to keep the new ones is to the left side of the garage, on the outside of the run, near where tose logs are. Then close off that portion of the run on the other side of the fence. That little side yard is about 50 feet long to the fence at the front of the house, but my neighbors house would be part of what keeps the chickens in, and we would have to fence off only two sides. I hope that makes sense...I practically confused myself!
Thanks

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