Spraying chickens with vinegar to integrate new members

[Apolinne]

Hello Friends,

So I have a question for the chicken and duck people. My grandma and my mom use this trick to integrate new chickens into the flock. When they buy new chickens they spray the whole coop, the old and the new birds with vinegar water before sleep and then they just put them together into the coop for the night. And then they spray them again in the morning before they let them out. That's it. I believe the ratio is 100 ml per 1 liter. The logic is that when they all smell the same they don't fight. And they don't. I've seen it used a bunch of times and they do establish a new pecking order, but never fight or bully anyone. And I just wonder if anybody else ever used it and what was your experience with it ?
Note: The flocks always had just one or no rooster.
I'm thinking about using it when I'll get new ducks, but I'm not sure if it will work.

Thanks

 

[FrostRanger]

Idk, most birds don't exactly have a fantastic sense of smell, chickens included. Nor do they identify each other by scent. I think they just got lucky and their setup was good enough and their birds chill enough that they could get away with doing that. A few people do have luck with just sticking a new bird in at night so I think that's more the part that worked and the vinegar was extraneous (not that it's generally advised to integrate by sticking them in at night, but it does sometimes work if your coop is big). I would personally do see but no touch for a week or 2 with the ducks as that's a safer method of integration

 

[Apolinne]

Right, I know that birds don't have a good sense of smell and I read a lot about the see no touch method, but no one really describes what behaviour to look for to know when the birds are safe to be released into the original flock.
Also what do you do if the method fails ? Like you do see no touch for a month and yet the birds still fight or something?

 

[FrostRanger]

Right, I know that birds don't have a good sense of smell and I read a lot about the see no touch method, but no one really describes what behaviour to look for to know when the birds are safe to be released into the original flock.
Also what do you do if the method fails ? Like you do see no touch for a month and yet the birds still fight or something?

You want them ignoring each other for the most part and if they're still fighting, you go back to see but no touch and try again. I had to do see but no touch for over a month when integrating a batch of chicks to a mildly aggressive hen. You just have to be patient, some birds handle integration better than others