When to Mix younger chicks

AimsChickies

Songster
11 Years
Sep 8, 2008
211
0
119
SW Florida
I have two 5 month old pullets, and a couple of younger chicks (maybe 1 month old or so). When would be a good age to mix the younger chicks in with the older ones?
 
I've always heard that it's best to introduce younger chicks to older chicks once the younger ones are similar in size. Just so they're big enough to ward off too much pecking. There WILL be pecking for certain. I've read that it's best to put the younger ones right next to the older ones in pens that are side by side so that they can see each other and be sort of acquainted w/ each other before they're officially in the same pen together. Of course, this is not how I did it though. But our chicks were only 1 month apart in age, so it wasn't too bad, but again, there WAS pecking. When we put the younger ones in w/ the older ones we did it at night time so they were mainly focused on going to sleep/roosting. Then Saturday morning we let them out of the coop, sat in chairs for a few hrs in the run & kept a broom handy in case the pecking got too bad. Then we just ckd on them a couple of times on Saturday & did the same thing on Sunday. Worked out pretty good. However, your age difference is a bit bigger than mine. Hope the above info helps though.
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I blended in 4 babies to my flock when th ebabies were 7-8 weeks old.

I started by letting them all free range together with supervision. once that was all fine, I moved the brooder into the coop and kept the babies in there - letting them out to free-range each morning - putting them back in at night.

I eventually opened up the brooder with a small hole, the babies could come and go but the bigger chickens couldn't. That was at around 9-10 weeks old.

I made a small safe area in the run just in case they needed to get away and get safe - the run is normally open anyway.

All is well.
 

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