What to Look for in a Broody Rooster

Eclipse molt?

Another broody rooster has just shown his colors. This one is a bullstag (cockerel) that was busted roosting with a two-week old Missouri Dominique chick. Rooster is also Missouri Dominique.

I let Slugger out for a couple of hours at end of day yesterday. He promptly went over to where other games are penned and began courting / harassing game pullets getting ready to wean chicks. A couple of his male offspring following him much of the way.

As of this morning he ramped up his crowing and hise juvenile offspring heading in direction opposite where Slugger wants to go. The juveniles now forage extennsively without their dad but he still has ability to call them in. Shortly I will go out with some mealworms, place them on ground in garage and Slugger will call back the entire brood which come from nearly a football field length away.

aart said:

Eclipse molt?

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Red pointy hackle feathers are falling out and being replaced by shorter black-tipped rounded hackles feathers that will be kept through end of summer when they are replaced with new red pointy hackle feathers. The red hackle feathers are breeding dress while the eclipse version I think are less flashy and possibly allow faster dissipation of heat. Most domestic poultry do not appear to undergo this cyclical change but many games and wild apparently all wild jungle fowl do. Some articles out there state no domestic poultry undergo an eclipse molt but the authors clearly did not do enough research before coming to that conclusion.


See following thread. First bird is Slugger's sire named Eduardo. Second bird of mine is Slugger as he transitioned from his bullstag adult breeding plumage to eclipse plumage. Vcomb presented another version of eclipse molt where the black eclipse feathers are shorter and darker like in a wild jungle fowl but still covered by breeding hackles farther up neck.


https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/535707/partial-eclipse-molt-in-american-game

centrarchid said:

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https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/535707/partial-eclipse-molt-in-american-game

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Fascinating....too bad some of the pics are gone.

I still have not gotten my backup harem master in place on pasture flock. Slugger has taken to running the entire 300 feet over to try and pickup chicks. All are with chicks so not interested romantically. He still tries and as of today runs around all pens trying to pick up ladies. What is extremely surprising is Slugger will not try to fight another male though the wire. He has done so briefly many times in past but it appears he is reluctant to start. Getting him to at least hesitate took at 3 years.

Additionally, his sister (Brownie) currently employed as a broody decided to bring her brood from cockyard into Slugger's realm and approached me directly for eats. Odds are she will attempt to roost on front porch tonight which I will allow. It is her birth place and she will be used for a field event with her chicks on Thursday which will make loading everyone up easier.

Slugger does not display love towards her chicks like his own and Brownie does not respond to Slugger's tidbit calls. She still flies up to me.

Brownie has moved into the garage with her chicks. She tried for about an hour to get brood up on front storage cabinet but the little simply are not ready. The location must be special to her. She was hatched there three years ago and hatched and raised two broods of her own in the same location in the intervening years. Additionally both of her parents spent their summer of juveniles there and caught June beetles until crop fill on hot summer nights. That was also the year we moved into house before even our first born and when the ragweed grew to nearly 8 feet tall. Memories for us all.

centrarchid said:

Brownie has moved into the garage with her chicks. She tried for about an hour to get brood up on front storage cabinet but the little simply are not ready. The location must be special to her. She was hatched there three years ago and hatched and raised two broods of her own in the same location in the intervening years. Additionally both of her parents spent their summer of juveniles there and caught June beetles until crop fill on hot summer nights. That was also the year we moved into house before even our first born and when the ragweed grew to nearly 8 feet tall. Memories for us all.

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How old are her chicks and why is their sire not as attentive as Slugger was with his brood?

From what I can see, Slugger has switched from exclusively the broody strategy to alternating with the player strategy. In doing this he covers a very a large area approximating a T-shape. Longest distance distance from one extreme to another is pushing 700 feet while next longest measure is 400 feet. He courts a group of hens at bottom of T to West and protects existing broods at top of T to East. Physically this effort requires exceptional stamina on foot. Just for fun, after work I will put up some electrified poultry netting blocking connection by foot between extremes of area he covers. If he does what I suspect, then he will resort to flying. It could get him into mindset to fly much more than typical for domestic birds.

aart said:

How old are her chicks and why is their sire not as attentive as Slugger was with his brood?

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Chicks are just shy of 2 weeks post-hatch. Sire is in a breeding pen and was separated from her once she began to set so he could be single mated to another hen. Sire currently can not able to provide a quality food source for chicks. While incubating Brownie was in her own pen but released when brood came off nest. Such kept hens do not associate with roosters in same manner as Blanch does with Slugger. Brownie's setup has been very similar to how most people keep their chickens and how In do when harems are multi-female.