Silkie turned from sweetest chick to bully

EvansMeXo

Songster
May 20, 2017
215
56
122
Nova Scotia
So I've been reading that some pecking is normal, it establishes the "pecking order" so when I put some 3 day olds into the brooder with my 1-4 week olds I expected some pecking but I'm starting to worry my silkie is a bully! Last Saturday I put 3 1-week olds in there with my easter egger and silkie and none of them have any issues! Then I add 2 3-day old white chantclers and 1 3-day old cream legbar and my EE occasionally pecks them but nothing bad, same with my black copper marans.. but my silkie! My sweetest chicken who seemed to be the most submissive of all I think he's bullying them!! And I think she's a he now because of this! He won't let the 3 day olds near the others he puts himself between them and puffs up and pecks them hard enough to make them chirp, half the time when their asleep he'll walk over and give them a peck to wake them up, he wasn't letting them eat or drink I had to add food all over the brooder so he had no control over it.. this morning I'm installing a new light and putting them in their own brooder to keep them safe from him! So my questions are 1) will he learn to love them? 2) does this behaviour signify rooster?
 
I've never had a rooster so I'm not positive about rooster behavior, but I have had aggressive hens. I've never introduced chicks to other chicks, (just 6-8 weeks old to adults) and some that are higher in the pecking order are just really mean! I have one hen that picks on my two others all the time (it started after something got in and got 5 of my chickens, the remaining three all changed a bit from the trauma). Sometimes it's being higher up on the pecking order or just being territorial about food.

I just have one question. When you introduced the chicks to the older chicks, did you just throw them right in? Had they ever seen each other before?
 
I've never had a rooster so I'm not positive about rooster behavior, but I have had aggressive hens. I've never introduced chicks to other chicks, (just 6-8 weeks old to adults) and some that are higher in the pecking order are just really mean! I have one hen that picks on my two others all the time (it started after something got in and got 5 of my chickens, the remaining three all changed a bit from the trauma). Sometimes it's being higher up on the pecking order or just being territorial about food.

I just have one question. When you introduced the chicks to the older chicks, did you just throw them right in? Had they ever seen each other before?


I started off with the babies in the sunroom and I brought out each of the others one by one too meet them and they all just kind of looked at them, pecked them once and then just ignored them, so I added them one by one to the brooder and they continued to ignore them... I got them at lunch time they were fine up until supper time (I checked frequently) but then sometime between supper-midnight the silkie started becoming mean, I could hear them peeping loudly so I kept checking on them and the silkie was starting to bully them.. by midnight they all settled down to sleep so I left them Be then this morning the silkie started up again, now I have the 3 day olds in a separate box I don't know how to go about getting them all to behave.. I was reading that at this young it should be easy to add new chicks
 
I always thought that the silkie was at the bottom until this started, it was always the most laid back and relaxed of them all, and she had no issues what so ever with the week old ones!
 
I've taken the silkie out of the brooder to let the others get used to the new additions and it's going great .. any my silkie is just sleeping on me like always lol she's really the sweetest thing ever! I don't know why she hates the new comers especially the female legbar
 

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What age was she when the one-week-olds were introduced?

Most of the time until about threeish weeks, chicks are easy to introduce, as they really don't have an interest in the pecking order. Once they get to that four-week mark they start to pick up on it. That might be why she was fine with the one-weeks but now she's not fine with the baby babies.
 
But if she's being continually mean I'd keep her separate for a while (a few days, but maybe arrange it so that she can see the other chicks, so it's like a time out) to lower her rank (it's what I do with mean hens) and she shouldn't be as aggressive. Also, small babies are super delicate so I'd be very careful if you can't give her a time out.

She's a cutie, by the way!
 
That makes a lot of sense! I introduced the week olds on Saturday so she was just slightly over 3 weeks, now she's 4 weeks. I've separated the babies from them but I'll switch it and put my silkie in the box next to them, everyone else is doing great with them but the silkie just doesn't want to accept them
 
I give my one hen two to three day time outs whenever she starts with her antics. It should work! Good luck and tell me when you put the Silkie back hoe everything goes!
 

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