Two weeks ago we had to put down our rooster Francesco. We rescued him about two and a half years ago from our local feed store Broccos. We had briefly kept another rooster seven years ago when we first got started in this chicken business. But his time came to an end once we realized how intent he was to attack our then three year old son. Going into rooster ownership this time was different. We were living in the country and we welcomed his morning (and frequently middle of the night) crowing as well as his macho ways.
In terms of temperament, he was a tolerable rooster I suppose. He did attack each one of us separately over the years which made us all stay attentive around him, yet he was beautiful and a character so we kept him around. We started noticing the last few months that he was having trouble with his legs. He seemed to spin around out of control when he tried to get up. It started as an occasional ‘spell’ but hastened over the months to the point where at the end, he wasn’t able to walk at all without falling over. The hens were starting to peck at him, he was clearly suffering and so we put him down. Our research has us concluding that maybe he had either brain damage from hitting his head or an ear infection that affected his equilibrium.
There was talk quickly afterwards of replacing him, however, for the time being, we are enjoying this new peaceful time in the chicken coop. I thought I’d sum up our pro and con list on having a rooster in case any of you happen to be on the fence.
Pros for Having a Rooster
- Living in the country, nothing says good morning like the call of a rooster. We miss that the most. His frequent crows made us and our guests smile.
- Roosters are quite protective of their harem. Whenever a hawk, owl, or quite frankly a low flying plane was overhead Francesco would give a certain call that would make all the hens come to him and they would all hide under a bush. When stray dogs entered in our yard he was the first on the scene to ‘fight’ for his ladies.
- You will get fertilized eggs. If you are interested in raising your own chicks from egg, it helps to have a rooster to keep the natural life cycle going.
- A rooster does keep the pecking order in check. In the past when we’ve introduced new chicks to the flock, the dominating hens can treat the new chicken terribly. There was a massive amount of chicken fighting. When we had Francesco and introduced new chicks to the flock the process of integrating them went much smoother. He gave them an initial ‘hazing’ and after that things went swimmingly. Much smoother than without a rooster to set the pecking order.
Cons on Having a Rooster
- They can be quite loud. Depending on where you live or your sensitivity to noises, one persons charming crow can be another persons annoyance. They do not give one hearty early morning wake up call, but instead crow anytime they want to express their importance, which is often.
- They can be aggressive to humans. When our oldest was three years old, our first rooster jumped up and tried two scratch his face twice. Our most recent rooster attacked me as I had gotten in between him and his flock of hens, it was a stressful situation for him and he decided to jump up and scratch and peck my leg. He made similar moves towards my two boys as well, so we always had to carry a large stick around him in case we needed to fend him off.
- They can be aggressive to hens. As much as we tried to put a romantic spin on the situation by giving him a handsome Italian name, Francesco was not quite the gentleman as we hoped. His version of foreplay looked like brutal assault. Hens typically loose a patch of back feathers due to roosters jumping on their backs. He used this dominant move anytime he didn’t like the way a hen was acting, if she was late coming back to the coop in the evening, or even if she walked into the same section of coop as him. I suppose that’s just natural animal behavior, but it made me resent him and his ‘abusive’ ways.
- They eat a fair share of grain and they don’t lay eggs. Your hens don’t need him to lay eggs either.
As I mentioned, we won’t be replacing him anytime soon. I’d like to hear from you, do you keep a rooster? What’s been your experience with them?
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We have kept chickens for 8 years and roosters are always going to be aggressive if they feel they are top dog. Our last rooster would always, ALWAYS, attack my eldest daughter who was afraid of him and occasionally our other two children and my hubby but never me. I wasn’t afraid of him and the first time he tried to attack me I caught him and trapped him to earth and pulled at the feathers at the back of his neck like a chicken would in a show of dominance, after that he treated me like top rooster. I have at least 9 roosters in my current flock. but will cull it back to two once we decide which ones have the nicest temperament both to us and the hens. We like to keep a rooster in a flock even when we aren’t breeding because he keeps the hens from squabble among themselves which has been in our experience far more violent than the rooster’s order keeping.
Oh yes, sweetlittlewood, thanks for reminding me about the hen-pecking that takes place without a rooster. I was going to put that point and forgot…let me add that!
p.s. you are pretty brave to tackle a rooster! No wonder he didn’t pick on you!
We have roosters we love and roosters we hate. The biggest problem with rooster ownership for us is that our birds are free-range, and the hens tend to take off and set on eggs in the grass or in other hidden nooks, reappearing with an unforeseen brood of chicks. Moreover, our first rooster was a Polish, simply for the amusing novelty, and several generations later, years since the first dude’s demise, the surprise offspring sport modified feather hats.
Good Morning Kendra
Now, I haven’t ever raised chickens or hens, but I’m a beekeeper. I’m wondering if it’s the breed of your rooster? I know that if you have a ‘hot’ hive and you requeen that hive with a gentler breed, you get sweet agreeable bees. A thought
Hi Jennifer, You are probably right. Little bantam roosters are a bit gentler, I’ve heard.
I have a bantam rooster and he is much quieter and he loves for me to pet him.
I’ve got three roosters—Napoleon, Big Man and Little Man. They’re all about five months old, hatched from eggs I put under my two broody hens. Little Man is a bantam and scares himself when he crows. Napoleon is a scaredy cat, but does love the ladies. Big Man will take on anything, especially the red-tailed hawks that dive bomb the barnyard.
They are loud and gorgeous and fight over the 16 ladies—they fight so much that the ladies almost always get away. It’s hilarious.
For ten years of egg laying hens, we never had a rooster and didn’t miss one a bit. Kept peace with the neighbors, even though we had a large farm and the gals made their own morning and laying noises to keep us entertained. We had lots of visitors and never had to worry about the hens, goats, cats or dogs being aggressive. The only intact males were our two bucks and one didn’t last long when he became to interested in me! My one rooster attack was at a friend’s farm and that sealed the deal for me. It was painful and took very long to heal. No roosters needed!
Enjoying the rooster debate! I think your list of pros and cons sums up what tends to be a personal choice! A city girl myself I volunteered to take a rooster off the hands of a friend who was showing me her adorable chicken coop. He was so beautiful and my neighbors up in the hills of Sonoma had roosters free ranging all around. Things I learned… those roosters were not my neighbors but dropped by fellow Sonomans who did not want roosters and they didn’t last as the were eaten by predators. Roosters without hens are really mean! My girls were in car seats and I kept a broom by my car to shoo off “Jamo” as he would attack me getting them buckled in their car seats! He loved to roost on my car and poop all over. I eventually found a home for him through our dog trainer as he had terrorized our golden retriever puppy! Over the years I (like everyone in Sonoma) have had my own flock. We have a very secure coop as we have had racoon/fox/dog issues over the years. We have had by accident several more roosters. I had neighbors complain and myself have tired of the crowing! I’m down to just three old hens now and after over ten years of raising chickens planning on taking a break!
I think it is a personal choice but I definitely think bantam or bantam mix roosters are easier to have. I’ve had 2 big breed roosters over the years and had to get rid of both of them as they would attack visitors. I had a little bantam for years who fussed around after his girls like a mother and was never a bother. At the moment I have a mixed beed rescue rooster and he’s lovely. It’s important to have 5 or 6 hens per rooster or they can get aggressive. And someone told me once that fertilised eggs are better for you… so who knows!
I currently have two roosters. They are both aggressive which is to be expected, I suppose. They are in a very large enclosed yard and each have their own hens. I think that is what keeps them from fighting with one another. That and the fact that one is much younger and has been thumped a time or two by the larger, older rooster, Tiny. My husband has been attacked more often that I have. If they attack me I chase then down and catch them which evidently has served as a deterrent because they rarely attack me these days.
And you’re right about the crowing – it’s NOT just a morning thing. They crow all the live long day. I love that they are so protective of the hens and they do keep the hen squabbling down to a minimum. The boys do not tolerate discord between the ladies. Gottal love them for that alone.
I have one rooster right now named Brutus…he’s a handsome gent and I love to hear him crow. He tried to chase off a fox that was after his hens and lost his tail feathers in the process. But as much as I like having him around, his offspring don’t seem to lay very many eggs. So I’m raising a couple of replacements and in a couple of months poor Brutus will go in the soup pot. But that’s what happens to all of my chickens, unless the fox gets them first. Such is life on my homestead.
Thanks so much for sharing on The HomeAcre Hop!
What a timely post, as we are facing the decision on if the rooster should stay or become soup. I’ve got a hen thats always broody, so we are regularly getting fertile eggs from a friend and she’s hatching them out. If they end up being boys, most get eaten the second they start to crow, but this last batch produced a gorgeous bird similar looking to your Francesco up there. He only crows a few times in the morning, nothing obnoxious (yet), and 0 signs of aggression, so he’s still here.
But yesterday, I found a note from a neighbor complaining about him and asking me to “attend to him promptly”. We are zoned county, so therefore allowed to have him, but now I’m faced with the decision on do I want to risk pissing off neighbors or exercising my legal rights (which is one of the reasons we bought where we did). As far as I know, none of the other neighbors are bothered by him.
I tried concocting a DIY version of a “no crow collar” but no difference.
So if I decide to bow to the pressures of the neighbor, and you want a replacement, he’s all yours!
We’ve had hens for just a few years now and only picked up a rooster because the neighbors kept asking us to get one – can you believe it? Enter King Richard I, or Richie for short. He was gentle with us and fabulous to the ladies. He died protecting his ladies from two stray dogs that came through the fence (which has been fixed, btw). We now have a new rooster, equally gentle so far, and have yet to name him.