[sue.hole]

We have had 8 rescue caged battery hens for a week in a separate enclosure adjoining our old 4 hens. the new ones are establishing pecking order and there are 2 very bossy ones guarding all the food. We need to build the others up before winter - one is called Starkey as she is starkers - bald front and back with a messed up beak to boot. Tonight we lifted the bossy ones out in the dark after they all went to bed and put them gently in to the old girls big hen house. Can't wait to see how it goes when i let them out in the morning ? -  but at least Starkey might get some food tomorrow !  :!:

[muntjac]

they should be fine now ,incidently if you want to move birds do as you did in the dark but use a red light/torch .cover it with coloured plastic or cloth .... i find red panties are useful  this stops the birds stressing and keeps em quiet  

[agapanthus]

they should be fine now ,incidently if you want to move birds do as you did in the dark but use a red light/torch .cover it with coloured plastic or cloth .... i find red panties are useful  this stops the birds stressing and keeps em quiet  

But surely the thongs you wear are not big enough to cover the front of the torch!! :roll:  

[muntjac]

i use the butt bit ,,,  

[sue.hole]

Let them out this morning and there was such a punch up - the new hens just wanted to go back to "their" run,the old girls made it quite clear they were not welcome,  so I opened the pop hole that connects to the outer run and let them return. We'll put that down as a fail then ! I'll leave the pop hole open now so that they can free range in the more neutral area, if they dare. Starkey is a bit jumpy , but is ok'ish. The only other thing i can do is put her in the broody coop, but I always leave that as a last resort, as no hen feels content in such a confined space, and we hate separating them.

[muntjac]

let em set a few days just seeing each other the they will smoke the peace pipe ....  

[dawninspain]

We have added new hens to our original flock a few times now. Our experience has been that when adding young POL hens they only need a few days in a run alongside the existing flock before they are accepted. Being younger they tend to be naturally subservient. However we recently added 3 hens who are older and they needed a good week of aclimatisation before we mixed them properly.  In all cases  they have all been put to bed in the same hen house and removed smartly in the morning into their respective runs.

Animals (and humans :!: ) do tend to pick on others that are different or not 100% fit so your ex-batteries, missing feathers etc might be having a rougher time of it. I have seen in other posts that sometimes it can take 2 or 3 weeks to mix the flocks peacefully.

Several feeders and drinkers help because the chief chicken(s) can't be everywhere at once.

Good luck.

[sue.hole]

Going to try the disorientation method tonite to swap the 8 new hens up to the bigger run and house and the 4 old hens down to the smaller house.....watch this space !

[Bodger]

Try puting the red panties over their heads ! :shock:  :shock:  :shock:

[stickywicket]

Can you mix any sort of breeds together big/small or are some combinations a recipe for disaster :!:

I am erring towards getting 3 docile bantam types but would be quite nice to add something a bit lively as well ... something with an intelligent twinkle in its eye to make life a bit more exciting  

[muntjac]

my birds used to mix no worries. wells and buff banties