When to move hen with chicks to the coop, when they hatched inside

[Wjeffgriggs]

When should I move a hen with her chicks to the coop when the broody hen was moved inside to finish the hatch? Chickens are free range 100% of the time so the coop was built for nightime housing only. Though off one nest box I temporarly caged it in with the top open so the babies cannot wonder off but mom hen can. Food and water will be in the area. Have 14 other chickens. Hen is a great mom so far first for the first day.

 

[aart]

Best cases scenario would be to have an area wired off for broody and chicks until about a week after hatch...then allow them to integrate with flock.
Need more info.
How old are chicks?
Is your coop big enough for all the birds you now have?

Oh, and....
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Climate, and time of year, is almost always a factor.
Please add your general geographical location to your profile.
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[Ridgerunner]

I would never set it up where he chicks could leave the broody hen's protection or the hen could go where the chicks cannot. To me one of the biggest risks of trying to isolate a broody and her chicks from the flock is that the chicks can get out through the fence but the broody hen cannot so she cannot protect them. That happens way too often.

Your proposal is the opposite, the broody can get out but the chicks cannot. Still dangerous. If the hen gets out she may try to get the chicks to follow her. They can't and she doesn't know enough to fly back in to take care of them. Another chicken may fly in drawn by the feed and harm the chicks. A predator, maybe a snake, gets in and she is so panicked she is trying to go through the fence, not knowing enough to fly in from the top. But my biggest concern would be that in a very short time some chicks will be able to fly out. The wing feathers are the first to come in for a reason. A chick can fly out, others won't, the one that flies out does not know to fly back in. That's a recipe for disaster.

If you are going to let a broody hen raise the chicks, then let her. Keep them together. She will do fine eating Starter, it's a great food for a non-laying broody hen. She can drink their water. She has no need to get out away from them. Keep them together.

Rant over, but I really do see that as dangerous.

Now to your question. I don't know what your coop looks like. Not just how big but what does it look like inside. How the chicks would get in and out could be pretty important.

My broody hens typically hatch in the coop and I let them manage this whole process. I provide food and water where the chicks can get to them and leave everything else up to the hen. She typically keeps them inside the coop for a couple of days before she takes them outside. At night she takes them to sleep on the floor of the coop, usually a corner but not always.

But when the coop is pretty crowded I move them to a shelter out inside my electric netting. I lock the hen and chicks inside that shelter for two nights so they imprint on it. After that I open the door and let them roam with the flock. To me that is the situation you are in, you need to get her to return her chicks to the coop at night.

I'd build a pen in the coop, assuming the coop is big enough and arranged so you can, and lock the broody hen and her chicks in there for two or three days and nights. Then open the door and let her take over. I'd expect her to take them back in the coop at night but check at bedtime to make sure she does. They don't always do what we think they should.

When to start this process? I do it as soon as the hen brings them off the nest. Usually the first couple of days the chicks spend a lot of time under the broody staying warm, but by the third day they are surprisingly mobile. They run around a lot for evermore. If you keep them in a pen in the coop a couple of days they will be in this more mobile phase when you open the door to that pen.

Your chickens free range, thanks for including that information. The are not squeezed into a small coop and run where the broody and her chicks can't get away from the adults at all. Since the hen has enough room to work with I would not expect any issues from the other chickens during the day. At night the hen should keep them under her, plus the others are sleeping at night. My broody hens are perfectly capable of teaching the others to not bother her chicks. I don't have any worries about that, but she has plenty of room to work with in my coop too, not just outside. You might want to be down there pretty early when they are waking up for a couple of days to assure yourself she is handling it. Mine always do but it never hurts to check.

For their own reasons others may wait to integrate the broody and her chicks, sometimes to the point that they have to stage a new integration for the broody when she weans her chicks and then another when they want to integrate the chicks. I avoid that by letting the broody hen take care of integration. If your coop can handle the total number of birds you have when they are adults the broody should be able to manage. If you don't have enough room then you have problems ahead anyway.

To me the critical time is not when the broody is taking care of her chicks, it's after she weans them and rejoins the rest of the flock, leaving the chicks to manage on their own. When will she wean them? Who knows? I've had a couple of different broody hens wean theirs as young as three weeks, I've had a broody take care of her chicks for three months. Somewhere between four to nine weeks is more common but they are all different. Even the three week olds managed fine. I've never had an issue with this either but my coop is plenty big to handle this. I don't know what sized coop yours may spend time locked together when they are awake.

 

[Acre4Me]

We also removed our broody from the flock to adopt some day old chicks. The brooder is in the barn and hen/chicks can access a fenced off area in the main run. The adoption occurred 3rd week of Feb - so really cold and windy weather and we kept them in the brooder for around 1.5-2 weeks before we could let them into the run based on weather. This was momma hens second batch of adopted chicks.

When we let them into the run, we used moveable fencing that we added mesh fencing to so that the chicks could not get away from momma's protection. While the top was open, it is about 3' high, so no adults flew over in either direction. Funny enough, a couple of chicks learned to fly up to the top of that fence and perch. It would have been easy for them to then fly into the main run, but none of them ever did, they would turn around and fly back to momma - however, I wouldn't rely on all chicks to be wise enough to remain on the momma side. Soon enough, the weather improved and the chicks got more feathers, and we enlarged their area and allowed the flock to get up and around their area for more see-no touch integration. Then about a week ago, we opened up the fence so they could have access to whole run, and momma hen was still protective and kept the rooster and a few of the opinionated hens away from her chicks. Today (they are 6.5 weeks old), they are blocked from entering their brooder, although we will allow them to sleep there for another couple of nights. Overall, our integration with this batch has gone slower than I anticipated due to the weather conditions. My expectation was to have them start to sleep in the coop by 6 weeks old, however, they will be more like 7 weeks old or so when that happens. The integration in the coop at bedtime is a whole other event - they are quite serious about roost space and position, so I want the older chickens very familiar with the chicks during the day.

Our other batch of momma hen raised chicks happened in the fall. Once we completed daytime integration, and put them in the coop, they figured out their places within a couple of weeks with space on the lowest roost and squabbles were minimal. However, those chicks remained as a group and it wasn't until they got closer to point of lay that they really and fully integrated with the flock, which is fairly common it seems.

Here are the latest batch of chicks on their first day in the fenced off run area. At this point, the rest of the flock could get close to this fence, but not right up to it. They were all fascinated by the chicks!

 

[Wjeffgriggs]

Sorry for the delay, You can see the caged off area to the right, but probably will move them to a dog crate inside the coop. The coop is small 6X6 ' but they only go in at night to sleep and are let out early morning. I am in middle TN and weather is mlid this time of year days 65-80 and nights 40 degrees. The hen is a OEGB and is very smart and has been doing great as a mom so far.

 

[aart]

You can see the caged off area to the right,

Has she been in there since she started brooding?
That looks fine.
What day is she on?

 

[Wjeffgriggs]

Has she been in there since she started brooding?
That looks fine.
What day is she on?

She is inside with 2 health chicks 48hrs now. She has been inside since Sunday, I moved her at night for her final days till hatch .Im in no rush to move them. Just didnt know how long I should let them stay inside until they get cabin fever.

 

[aart]

She is inside with 2 health chicks 48hrs now.

Inside the house or inside that barrier around the coop nest?

 

[Wjeffgriggs]

Inside the house or inside that barrier around the coop nest?

House

 

[Ridgerunner]

I'm guessing you are talking about what looks like a dog crate off tho the right? I'd put small mesh around the bottom so the chicks cannot get out, those openings are probably too big to contain thm.

The hen may have trouble getting the chicks up that ramp the first several days when you let them out. I would not be surprised to see her sleeping on them under that ramp at first. Or her at the top of the ramp telling her chicks to come on up but the chicks being under the ramp instead of knowing to go to the end and walk up. So make sure you check on them at bedtime and move them inside the coop at night because of predators if you need to. The chicks should learn fairly quickly but some are better than others about that.

From a temperature viewpoint there is no reason to not have the hen and her chicks outside.