The Poultry Keeper

crazypianolady · Joined: 26 Mar 2008 Posts: 728 Location: Nottinghamshire

I've got my two new girls in a small coop (okay, converted kennel) with a run sharing a fence with the 'old girls.' Each side has inspected the other several times, without too much shouting from either party.
At what point do I let the two groups together? And at what time of day?
(Had great fun getting the new ones to go to bed. They wanted a branch. I needed them safely locked in their coop! I won) Smile

Dusty · Joined: 07 Jan 2008 Posts: 770 Location: St. Asaph

Just had a new pekin, kept her in a separate run last night because the weather so bad.

Put her out on the paddock in the run with the big girls today and they all had a chat together with no hassle. Smile

I let the pekin into the coop this afternoon and she went straight into the nest box Twisted Evil

Big girls went in as usual but were unsure of new addition who was staying put.

She'll be on a roost tomorrow hopefully with the big girls approval Laughing

Kitsune · Joined: 13 Mar 2008 Posts: 1335 Location: Manchester

if they seem fine with each other then let them range together supervised, any sign of trouble (a bit of pecking is fine, you'll know when it's serious!) sepearate them again for a couple of days. Helped a friend introduce a roo to a pair of hens, that was a bloodbath! 2 weeks later they are together and happy Smile

JustChickens · Joined: 24 Mar 2008 Posts: 880 Location: Sussex

I went down to just 2 hens.. a few weeks ago i bought 5 new pullets hoping to get them all living together. For the first 2 weeks i kept them seperate dividing the pen with chicken wire (so they could hear see and get close to one another without any damage) over the next week i let them run together (i was always with them incase things got out of hand), and they seemed to get on ok, hardly any fighting.

Anyway one day i went down to see the girls and they had jumped the chicken wire and were all getting along fine. So i decided to leave them to it, now there all together and getting along great! and theres only the occasional peck from one of the older hens.

Hope that helps, Rich

crazypianolady · Joined: 26 Mar 2008 Posts: 728 Location: Nottinghamshire

Watched the youngsters at bed time last night, and they were very keen to follow the big girls into their coop. So today I put the two new girls in with the others, and there's been a lot of chasing round and the odd peck or two.
The fun started at bed time, with the new hens wanting to roost in a bracnh, not in the coop! I ended up waiting until the others had gone in and the two new ones had found a 'safe' branch (NOT) about a foot off the floor, and put them in the coop with the others.

We'll see what tomorrow brings!

vanessa · Joined: 24 Sep 2005 Posts: 1237 Location: Correze

Evening is generally recommended as the best time to do the final introductions.

gentle1973 · Joined: 30 Mar 2008 Posts: 14 Location: Poole, Dorset

I think we must be really lucky with our introductions. We've had two pekin bantams for a week now and yesterday we got a third. We just put her in with the other two and kept our fingers crossed.

One of the existing hens occasionally pecks the new one, but only if she tries to get to the food before her! The other existing hen was preening the new one this afternoon, can't quite work this out as I thought she was "top" hen, but surely, the top hen wouldn't preen a new one?

Hope this makes sense!

Wendy

crazypianolady · Joined: 26 Mar 2008 Posts: 728 Location: Nottinghamshire

Both the youngsters are now in with the others, there's a bit of pecking if the new ones forfet their place, but otherwise all seems well. The new ones do insist on sleeping in the nesting box, though!