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- #21
Mary Poopins Love
Songster
When in October? I joined the day before my chicks hatched.
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For thousands of years the way this was handled on most farms and other places was that the hen would hatch with the flock and raise the chicks with the flock from Day 1. You are dealing with living animals so you don't get guarantees, anything could possibly happen. But problems from other chickens were pretty rare, not often enough to change this model. I grew up on one of those farms and we never had a problem with the other chickens.I was wondering if it would be safe to keep any chicks with mama in the main coop with everybody.
Again, room can be critical to this. How big, in feet or meters, are your coop and your run? Please don't use words like "big" or "a lot", those don't mean anything. There are several threads on here where someone has a problem and say they have a lot of room, where the real problem is that they don't have nearly enough. Photos showing your coop and run and how they are arranged can help with specific suggestions.I have two 5 week old chicks. when should I start introducing them into the flock? Should I even bring them outside?
I have had 3 different broodies raise a clutch of chicks in with my main flock. All 3 of my broodies were very good mothers and would beat the living daylights out of any chicken that got near her babies.
Ah yes, that's a good point.Yes, that can work very well, as long as there is enough room for them to spread out. I have had hens that wanted all other chickens to stay 10 feet away from their chicks, which would obviously cause trouble in some sizes of coops or runs. Not that the chicks would be in any danger, but the other hens might suffer if they have to be "too close" and mamma hen beats them up!