Questions about integrating my 5 hens with the new 16 pullets...

Kelly G

Crowing
17 Years
Mar 19, 2008
1,997
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Waynesville, North Carolina
My Coop
My Coop
My order from Ideal (see list in my signature below) should be here on Thursday or Friday and my brooders are set up & ready to go! I know that it will be a few months before I can integrate my 5 existing hens into the 16 new pullets, but at what age should I do the integration?

My new chicks will be raised in the new, bigger coop...and when they are big enought, I will move the hens I have now in with the pullets...that way the young pullets will have the "home field" advantage...I just don't know when the best time is to make that move.

Thanks!
 
I had a similar situation but I had two old hens and moved 10 young pullets in with them. They did fine - the older hens were the "bosses" but didn't pick on the younger ones.
I moved them at maybe 4 months old - can't remember exactly.
 
I would say when they're old/big enough to fend for themselves. If you put that many new birds in with the existing flock, there probably won't be a lot of pecking and fighting. I would do it at night when the birds are asleep... they'll wake up to new neighbors and probably won't think anything of it.
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IMO they should be about the same size or they will be bullied a lot. But it's good that there is a bunch of them rather then just 2 or 3
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They will have their group to hang out with. Watch them close for a while after adding and before adding be sure that they can all see each other through some sort of blockade (I used a cage with hardware cloth for walls) for the first two weeks. Good luck!
 

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