[too many girls]

i got my 58 girls from a local barn reared place 2 weeks ago, although they are not in as bad a condition as most ex bats they were still quite poor ( only about 8 fully feathered and without sores)  i had to seperate the really bad ones as they were getting picked on by the stronger birds, i have looked after them the best i can and have been rewarded with masses of eggs and no losses so far, i would definately go for ex bats if i were you, i don't think they are harder to look after plus when they recover they tend to be more friendly and more rewarding than regular hens. good luck, i think you'll make great parents.............

[Foxy]

Trouble with me is that I hate driving and all the ex-bat rescue missions are never anywhere near my neck of the woods (Bristol) if anyone ever knows of any in my area-ish please could you let me know

Will let you know!

[mtoyne]

Hiya, we went for healthy chickens first then adopted some ex batts. I found looking after the healthy girls scary at first as i was new to keeping chickens so i honestly think that if you feel strongly about getting ex batts then do it now. i love all my girls but i sometimes look at my healthy ones and wish id got all ex batts. after a couple of days you will be at ease with looking after chickens. Another problem that we had was introducing the ex batts to our healthy girls, sorting out the pecking order is normal behaviour but our ex batts just wernt strong enough to cope with it, we had to keep them seperate for nearly a week. they all get on great now. good luck.

[niccid]

well looking at the land we have available and making some calculations we have decided that we have more than enough room for 15 BUT will take on 10 instead of the 5 that we were going to get. LOL it's gone from 5 to 10 in less than a week, but the more ex-bats we can rescue the better eh.

[niccid]

going to post pictures of our progress

[Porffor]

sounds great glad you are getting more.. how much land have you got for them?

really hope they settle well..
interesting reading Mtoyne's comments about ex-batts and healthy chooks..  :?

[niccid]

For now we have 130 sq ft to give our girls, which is pretty good for 10 I think.