pecking | Better Hens and Gardens

Integrating Young Pullets Into the Flock

It’s starting to feel a bit like fall, so it’s time to think about integrating chicks hatched in the spring into the main flock. Our day-old chicks arrived on May 10th, so they passed the 14 week mark last Thursday, and are big enough to combine with the adult birds. Fourteen weeks are generally when I think pullets are large enough to integrate in, and it usually coincides with the arrival of fall if the chicks were hatched in the spring.

Last year, two of our Buckeyes hens went broody and raised chicks, so they took care of teaching the young birds [...]

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Keeping Roosters

Rooster 38 at 18 Weeks

The Buckeye roosters are driving us crazy with their crowing and fighting (they’re now 24 weeks old), so we need to select two roosters to keep. And, it’s important to pick the best two, because they’ll be the foundation for the flock.

I get a lot of questions about why anyone would want roosters. The first question is often, do you need roosters for eggs? And no, roosters aren’t necessary for eggs; but they are necessary for fertile eggs. That leads to one reason for keeping roosters; in our case, we’d like the hens to go [...]

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Introducing New Chickens

Bringing new chickens into an established flock should be easy, right? Well, when my friend offered me a young rooster, I found out there are some basics to keep in mind.

Figuring that a Barred Rock rooster would be ok with three Golden Buff hens, I simply added him to their pen. Things went downhill from there (more on that later). Turns out, I should have had a plan.

8 Steps to Success

Verify that the new birds are in good health, and have been properly vaccinated.
Make sure they’re old enough – at least 14 weeks, or as large as the birds they’ll join.
Keep [...]

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