charlie the rooster is history

[bj taylor]

we did the deed tonight. gosh, I hate it. very upsetting. I would like to swear off roosters for awhile. it's different raising one to "keep". I get emotionally vested in them. I wanted things to work out with him so bad. he wasn't a bad rooster. he was just what he was, but I couldn't let him keep tearing up my hens. it wasn't fair to them to make them suffer for him.

I've got some roosters coming up, but I don't know if I want to keep any or not. I don't have to decide right now, so i'll take the scarlet o'hara approach & think about it tomorrow.

 

[baymule]

Awwww......... I'm so sorry you are upset over this. Yes, you do get emotionally invested in animals. You can say you love your rooster, but hate his behavior. Sorry things didn't work out with him.

 

[Chickie'sMomaInNH]

have you looked for hen saddles? i had some but i can't seem to find mine since we moved. one of my hens is the favorite to most of my boys and she is always bald by the time spring arrives. i've noticed they are finally leaving her alone and her feathers are starting to come back in.

 

[bj taylor]

thanks baymule. I appreciate it. chickie's MomaInNH, I almost bought some saddles, but it's so hot here, I have been worried it would cause the birds to overheat. do I have to wait for them to molt before their feathers will grow back?

 

[journey11]

Aww, sorry BJ. I've had no luck with roosters either. I've had 2 beautiful roosters that I got quite attached to and loved to see them gracing my backyard (and a couple not-so-handsome roos too.) All have flogged my young daughter and that was their que to go. I would love to keep a roo...I really love to hear them crow! But I can't have that going on. It's a real bummer. I have a straight-run batch of 15 EE's growing up right now and I will try again to keep one, but odds are not good. I'd like to have fertile eggs to hatch.

 

[Chickie'sMomaInNH]

thanks baymule. I appreciate it. chickie's MomaInNH, I almost bought some saddles, but it's so hot here, I have been worried it would cause the birds to overheat. do I have to wait for them to molt before their feathers will grow back?

it depends if the feathers fell out, pulled out or were broken. most times the feathers seem like they look tattered and broken at the ends, those will not grow back till the girls molt or pluck/groom them out one at a time. if they are breaking close to the skin i've noticed my girls will pluck the little stem out to force the feathers to regrow quicker. if the boys have been aggressively plucking the feathers trying to catch the girls, those feathers will come back soon and not have to wait till they molt. most times the back feather damage is from the boy's spurs rubbing against the feathers to stimulate the girl. in my coop i notice more girls bald on the top of their heads than their backs, probably from the younger boys making unsuccessful attempts to mate. head feathers are harder to protect, also hard to stand seeing because the boys eventually grab the skin on the girls once they have no more head feathers.

only those girls they really love to catch have the broken backside feathers, right now that appears to be only 4 girls out of 15, only Boof my bantam buff cochin is the worst with not much left on her back and head. seems that frizzles have a severe problem too, but it could be because their feathers can be brittle. this used to happen to one of my older frizzled cochin girls. she would look so bare in the spring it gave her air conditioning till the feathers grew back by the late summer/early fall. my 2nd worst is Gracie a white frizzle faverolles pullet, Gracie's mom Emma would be 3rd, and then comes Etta May my bantam salmon faverolles hen. Boof is showing a lot of pin feathers right now so i think that may be why the boys have been leaving her alone-she's cranky from the sensitivity of the blood forcing those feathers to grow back in.

 

[ducks4you]

Honestly, I like butchering and eating my birds. As long as you are decisive and quick about it, it is what people have been doing in raising livestock for thousands of years. We incubate eggs--this will be our 3rd year, now--and there is no reason to inbreed, so we eat our roosters at 2-3 months old. They are slightly larger than a rock cornish hen (grocery store size), and the meat is very healthy.
I get about a dozen eggs/day from 17 hens, which is more than I got from purebred RIR's, so I like mutts.
I have two EE roosters to breed with this year, just brought home 5 EE pullets, about one week old, and will be looking for a new rooster this fall. I might go with a White Leghorn, to continue to outcross.
My one really aggressive 2012 rooster--I had 3 roosters last year--was, I believe a rosecomb RIR. He had to be beaten 6x so he'd stop attacking me when I fed and watered. He also beat up the hens. The two roosters I have this year don't do that. They are both mild, and their hens groom them.

 

[Ridgerunner]

The only time Ive had a serious problem with barebacked hens was with the first group I got when I moved here. It was one adolescent rooster and about a dozen pullets before I evaluated the pullets laying ability and got down to seven hens. Anyway, it was only three hens with a serious problem, no cuts but bare skin. That was serious enough for me. I really think brittle feathers like ChickieMoma mentioned had a whole lot to do with the problem for those three, but others were showing some wear too. That adolescent cockerel did not have great technique.

I dont think his spurs were the big problem. He didnt have a whole lot more than nubs for spurs. I think his toenails were doing the worst of the damage when he was grabbing on.

I used a Dremel tool and cut off the tips of his spurs, what little there was. At least that blunted or dulled the tip. But I also trimmed his toenails. I didnt take off much, just blunted them with a square cut to dull them.

I trimmed both spurs and toenails so I cant say with absolute certainly which did the most good. I did remove those three barebacks from my permanent flock when deciding which ones to keep. The problems with the others quit getting worse, even after I got down to seven hens and his spurs grew back even bigger and he sharpened his claws by scratching.

I think my problem was a combination, brittle feathers to the point it became dangerous and his adolescent technique, which he eventually outgrew.

BJ, hard as it was, I think you made the right decision. At that age, he had enough time to get his act together. I never enjoy the killing part, even with the brutes, but sometimes it is necessary.

 

[baymule]

rooster pedicure! Did you paint his toenails?

 

[Ridgerunner]

Nope, just filed them good.