What age to let chickens out to forage ?

[bedrockfarm]

this is my second year with chikens and with the first 8 or so that we have, we let them out into an open top pen with two of our goats and and that started from about 12 weeks old or so and after about the first week 5 of them figured out how to "escape" and so they free-range over our 5 acres. we currently have 12 chicks that are about 6-7 weeks old and are getting ready to turn them out of our little coop with the others

 

[redneck farmer]

I let my 3, 18 week old an 2, 12 week old out today an literally just opened up the coop all the way an they let themselves out an did not go more than 10 ft from the coop

 

[BCollie]

I have 13 chicks that are about 6 weeks old, I've been letting them free range(with me out there) for over a week now. Of course, I have a working dog who herds them all to me when I'm ready to put them back! I just say "Alright Nell, let's round 'em up" and she herds them right to me so I can scoop them up and bring them back to the brooder...but tomorrow is their last day living in the brooder.

 

[Fancychooklady]

Mine love apples, but I just drop it on the ground and stomp it with my boot. I have a park bench outside the coup, when they are young I let them out for an hour os so while I sit and watch. They usually stay nearby, jumping up and down on the bench and me. When its time to go back to the pen, a shake of the bucket and they come running.

 

[vickiw]

mine are now 9 wks old and have been out for the past week. However, what we did is we added another pophole to the coop, fenced off a small section of the run and lined a cage up with that pophole on the inside of the coop so they have their own "safe place" inside the coop away from the big girls, have their own little sun porch, ramp and play yard but are able to see the big girls (no roos) and everyone gets locked in at night more or less together. It also allows me to control what they eat better (keeps them out of the layer feed and keeps the girls from eating all the chick/grower feed). I'll give this arrangement another week or two before I allow them to mix. My girls are only allowed to "free range" in my garden area where they are protected by several fences. We live in a rather wild area where there are just too many preds to allow them to wander on their own. Neighbor does that and has to constantly keep "re-stocking". Sounds bad, but she's feeding the wild things so so far I haven't had any problems.

 

[RoxyBird]

I usually let hand-raised pullets out during the day as soon as they are old enough to mix in with the grown hens (my flock is somewhat hand-picked to be pretty serene/non-combative, so that's about 6-12 weeks for us depending on chick size/growth rate... with about 2 weeks lead time in an adjacent enclosure so the flock mostly looses interest in terrorizing them). I live in a city and the neighborhood cats & ferals have all learned the hard way not to mess with my girls... and not to mess with or stalk the pullets because the hens will run them off just for being nosey/suspicious. I do have a fence up to prevent neighbor dogs from entering the yard.

We have hawks here but they are rather few- and my backyard is almost fully tree-covered, so I haven't had issues with them.

In a situation with no adult hens/guardians/humans present... I do not let the pullets out until at least 4 months. That said, no big deal to let them out earlier if you are working on the coop or gardening... they don't go far. For my friends raising chickens for the first time (no other birds to train the newcomers + curious cats who aren't afraid of or friendly with chickens yet, etc) I usually advise waiting until at least 4-6 months to let them out unattended, depending on how quickly they grow/what the fencing situation is/feral or stray cat situation, etc.

I now have a broody 1 year old PBR sitting on a clutch. Based on some advice of a more experienced chicken-keeper, I will probably let her take the chicks out at around 2 weeks (once they're less fragile). She's already acting crazy protective so as long as she maintains that attitude she can take 'em wherever she wants.

 

[mgray]

At 6 weeks I put the 6 Plymouth Rocks in an outside run, and brought them in at night. At 8 weeks, they stayed out all day, and in a divided coop ( away from and protected from the 20 week old Marans) at night. Finally, at 12 weeks they free range the same as the Marans but I still have the divided the coop for them at night. And, the Marans stay together and the Plymouth Rocks stay together. I had thought they would form one flock but so far they haven't.

 

[ladrholman]

My chicks got out at about week 2 but then again they are being supervised by their mom!!!

 

[blumoonky40906]

...

I was also wondering.....my first batch of chickens were not let out to range until they were older as I was concerned about my dog attacking them. Now that I know she and our pup we added are not chicken killers we got more chicks this year. They are 15 weeks old or so and am coming up to time to begin laying eggs at some point soon. I was letting them out to range however as laying time is getting closer I am concerned they will learn to lay all over the yard rather than in the coop. Do yall wait until they lay consistently in the nest boxes before allowing them to range?
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When our free range hens wanted to nest in the fence row in stead of the nesting boxes we kept the in the pens until late afternoon, around 3:30 or so, before they were,allowed to range. That took cars of the problem since most hens lay dawn til about 3:00.

 

[katsdar]

I too have a safe pen that I put my babies in for the day and then move them to their brooder at night and the big girls and boys get to free range and they go to bed by them selves in the big house, when it is time to introduce the babies after they have fully feathered out I put their brooder in the pen next to the big house and let them see each other then leave the brooder open and sooner or later the new birds follow the others into the big house and when that happens it is time to remover the brooder, It's pretty big takes 2 people to move it then it's still a job, but then I clean it really well and get ready for the next batch. You can see that the big chickens go to their baby house and it's like hey that's mine, if it is drying after a cleaning and open you will find a couple of big birds in it. They must be remembering their baby days