Integrating chicks into a flock?

[Barredrocker99]

They would have plenty of room to hide from the big girls if they happen to bully them

To me this is a key aspect. I don't know what you mean by "plenty of room", I have no idea what you base that on. Can they get out of line of sight and stay out or can the adults see them? Or maybe stay so far away it's not worth bothering them? It's not just square feet, it's also the quality of that room.

What often happens with mine is that if their personal space is violated the older ones run the younger ones off. That may be a peck and they run away but chasing may also be involved. If the younger ones don't have enough room to get away and stay away it can get bad. Some hens are just sadistic brutes toward weaker chicks or chickens and will seek them out to destroy them but I find these to be relatively rare in my flock. Sometimes chicks as young as two weeks being raised by a broody hen can intermingle with the adults without a problem.

The idea behind housing them across wire is that some chickens will attack strange chickens. That can be a rooster or one of the hens. This does not mean that every chicken in the flock will immediately try to run off or kill any stranger they see. From what I've seen most will not. But enough do that it is often beneficial to house them across wire for a while so they are no longer strangers when they mingle.

Just curious, why wouldn't just putting them into the coop not work?

Sometimes it will. Each chicken has its own personality. Some coops are big enough and have enough hiding places or ways to avoid the older ones that it can work. This is not a black or white issue, there is a lot of gray involved. It's not that it never works or that it always works, there are a lot of different factors involved. You don't get guarantees with our suggestions, they are intended to help your chances of success.

My brooder is in the coop so my brooder-raised chicks grow up with the flock. My broody hens raise their chicks with the flock from Day 1. I have a relatively large coop with enough clutter. Even when I am crowded every chick or chicken has at least 60 square feet per chicken outside and I have weather where they (adults and chicks) can be outside all day every day. I have several feeding and watering stations, inside the coop and outside. My brooder raised chicks are roaming with the flock at five weeks of age. My broody raised chicks make their way with the flock on their own whenever the hen weans them. A couple of times that has been as young as 3 weeks. 4 weeks isn't unusual. Mine don't start sleeping on the roosts until they are older but when I open the coop in the morning it is pretty normal for the chicks to be on the roosts while the adults are on the coop floor. Those five feet high roost are a safe haven for them. If your roosts are low enough that the older ones can peck them when they are on the roost it is not a safe haven.

A lot of the time these integrations go really well, even if you don't follow all of our suggestions. Really, it can be that easy. But dumping small chicks in a small tight coop or coop and run where they are shoehorned together is no very likely to work.

Oh sorry for not being a bit more specific. They have quite a big run(about 20 feet long and ten feet wide, with a pretty good sized coop too), with several areas to be out of sight from the other girls, including pallets I have made sort of a loft out of, several perches, a very large nesting area... I also live in the middle of the woods with a VERY large yard, and the chickens free range all day (almost always supervised!).There are tons of areas around the yard that they can hang out by themselves. The three younger ones that I have right now have completely integrated into the flock, but still like to hang by themselves, and the big girls leave them alone because there’s enough room Thank youfor taking the time to share your suggestions/experiences, you seem like you know your stuff!