Recent content by Daisy8s

As another person said, the age of the kids does matter. I would never keep a rooster that attacked a child, ever. Our rooster never did and I think that was because the kids were too young at that age to be doing any of the chores. I caused most of the problems with my rooster by setting up...

I"m truly touched by your thoughtful response! I'm so glad to see this post helping people in exactly the way I had hoped it would.

Invest in a pair of easy slip on/off rubber boots to be your barn shoes. The big rubber "wellington" style boots aren't form fitting and one pair will fit most adults. Use these each time you're in the coop and then leave them on a porch so you're not tracking poo into the house. We do the...

How did you get the chicks? Did you order them? If so, did you order a "straight run"? This will be a mix of hens/roosters (and since the hatchery wants to get rid of roosters it'll be a LOT of roosters). I don't know what breed(s) you have. Different breeds show different characteristics of...

What a lovely story! Rooty sounds like he has tons of personality. I'm glad you decided to let him live out a life among the girls doing his rooster thing!

Great! I wrote this story for others who were looking for ideas. Glad you got some from my post.

So glad you enjoyed it!

Oh, I'm so glad this post was helpful! You were exactly the kind of chicken owner I was thinking of when I decided to finally put thoughts to paper and share them. The funnest part of observing the rooster was learning to differentiate his many sounds/calls. Once we realize another species has...

Are there any experienced chicken owners in your area who could come out and observe the flock? Sometimes it's hard to know what to look for unless you've seen a certain behavior many times before. Perhaps you could reach out to local 4H people to see if someone near you is a bit of an expert...

Thanks for the defense. You clearly understood the point I was trying to make. (I think we can also agree that hentown is just a troll looking to stir up some trolly fun.)

Thanks! I do enjoy a well told story!

Thanks, newhamplover! I agree with you completely that it's our job to observe and understand the way the animals in our care are communicating with us. One of my favorite sayings that holds true of both humans and animals is: "behavior IS communication."

I had two bantam broodies nesting side-by-side in a box meant for one full-sized hen. Unfortunately other hens continued to sneek in and lay eggs after the brooding started so we had no idea when the hatching would start and how long it would go. In the end it was a beautiful thing. As the...

I told my husband I'd posted this story and he reminded me about the morality tale of my mother and her luggage. In order to further illustrate my point about the role humans play in rooster aggression, I'll tell this part, too. My mother lived with us for the first year of The Rooster's...

Good points. Thanks for commenting, varidgerunner. The rooster in my story was a factory grade Barred Rock that was one of millions produced by that hatchery. I doubt that temperament was ever a factor in their breeding choices; preferring instead to focus on egg production and color. Now...