thank you greenhouse I will have to try that. Yes tootsie roll the surviver was guaring her food yersterday and did not want the other's close to it. They are still separated but so far so good, I will let the screen up for maybe a couple more days and then let them all toguether with supervition see what happens.
Very sad thing happened today.
We have a separate screened section in our coop that we use when we have young ones. Until they are big enough to stand up for themselves but too big for the chicken tractor they go in there and then out to a little fenced off area. That way they can all supposedly get used to each other without having the older ones be able to peck at or harass the little ones. I guess it helps...
So happy this turned out well for you!
Thank you guys for all the wonderful advice. Yes I still have the screen on to separate them but I do let tootsie roll out to mingle a little bit with the others until they start getting nasty again and then I have to separate them, boy I really hope they can work out their differences and just get along. They are almost like politicians don't you think LOL.
Eventually you will just need to let them work it out. Things will settle down once they agree on who is the "top" chicken...the resource guarding is usually the worst part. I just stick food and water in all over the place for the first few days (or weeks).
Yes I will do as you suggest with the water and food, I just want to give them just a few more days. By the way here's what I got from one of the chickens yesterday ( Tuffy), I am very excited.
Boy I missed a lot, had to pick up my kids from summer camp and was gone a couple of days. Glad to hear all is working well and you got more hens...YAY!
how are the girls doing?? Getting along any better??
Donna forgot to mention what happened the day before yesterday. Well as you well know my DH has not placed a roofing structure over the run just yet, he wants to make a nice looking one so all the neighbors don't complain. Well I was letting tootsie roll (the survivor) mingle with the others and tuffy was pecking tootsie every once in a while, I left for just 2 seconds and all of a sudden I see tuffy flying over the other side of the back fence. My back fence has a buffer area that is overgrown with weeds, the builder did it I guess to make a drainage for when it rains, but the weeds are taller than I am and there are a lot of brambles growing, I am sure that we even have snakes there etc... thank God my DH was home, he ended up climbing the fence to the other side and having to cut as many of the jungle weeds as he could with an electric trimmer, finnaly he was able to get tootsie out of there but man what a struggle. Anyways she is completely O.K did not even get hurt which I was really impresed and even gave us a nice egg the next morning.
My DH got up today and place them together again this morning but I just had to separate them again, I just don't want this to happen again so I am waiting until maybe we can place some sort of roofing structure over the run before I let them be all together again. Tootsie is still getting pecked by the others but the once that is always getting at her is tuffy, sometimes I wonder if they will ever get along or not, but I guess time will tell.
Temporarily you could cover your run with bird or deer netting to prevent escape - it is almost invisible so the neighbors should be okay with it.
Thanks porkpal never thought of bird netting. I will tell DH but I think hopefully this weekend we will work on a new roofing structure. He just want's to keep the rain out of the run as well and also provide some shade for the birds.
leave a small section where it gets rain and sunshine. They do like to lay in the sun some especially in winter. You can get bird netting at Lowes. They sell it to cover fruit trees to keep the bird off