hen behavior

Guys I just bought an asil hen today I already have a rooster of the same breed he has about an inch spur now the problem is that he try to dance around her but she won't even respond to him she does not run but walk away when I toss some food to them the rooster offers it to the hen the hen will come and spread her neck feather like she wants to fight him he runs away from her.I know he is not a coward one because I rescued him from a cock fight he was one hell of a fighter once now I have a question is she dominant over him or is it a normal behavior will she ever let him mate with her because I want to have some chicks from them .thanks

Was she reared with roosters present, or in an all-female flock? That strongly impacts how likely a hen is to tolerate a rooster. Given time, and it can take a few months to a year sometimes, she should come around, even if she won't have a bar of him to begin with.

He's doing the right stuff by the sounds of it, identifying his gender and maturity and instinct levels, showing her he can provide food like a decent rooster should, avoiding conflict so she comes to trust him and not view him as a threat, etc...

If she's not used to boys then as far as she'll be concerned, he's just a strange hen; however since you don't mention any fights having occurred, I reckon she knows he's a male, and perhaps she was broody at the last place or going into brood, so is still feeling antisocial, or perhaps she's just taking her time to assess him.

Most roosters and hens I've brought into my flock are more inclined to observe the new animals for a week or so, not jump straight into mating and being a cohesive flock. They've got some complex social dynamics, both roosters and hens judge one another for reproductive fitness based on exhibited health, intelligence, dominance, instinct etc, and as far as I know Asils are supposed to be pretty instinctive birds. Given time they should pair up. To be blunt, it's a pretty stupid chook that just immediately mates with other chooks it's only just met, in my experience. Smart ones choose wisely.

If she's being aggressive to him with body language but not outright attacking, then most instinctive, intelligent roosters will just avoid conflict till she settles down. It doesn't mean he's submissive or she's dominant, it just means he's just playing peacemaker and avoiding counterproductive conflict. A rooster that springs into attacking hens that are standoffish is severely counterproductive, needless to say. A dead hen lays no eggs, so she certainly won't be passing on his genes if he kills her.

Neither of them needs to dominate one another to become a social unit, that's not the natural order of things, since naturally the breeders tend to be the dominant male and dominant female and they control their own gender, not the other gender. They're more of a team. There's no need for a fight between them. He's not trying to take her alpha hen role and she's not trying to take his alpha rooster role.

It's a smart rooster that waits for the hen to be receptive rather than trying to get her to mate when she's not receptive. There's a reason females exhibit receptive or non-receptive behaviors, and instinctive roosters know this, and they know the right times to initiate mating. Quite often the hen will invite them at the right time. Stupid roosters will coerce matings under some really stupid circumstances, e.g. with dying, ill, injured, brooding, laying, eating, dustbathing (etc) hens, which can all be completely unsuccessful matings as far as achieving successful reproduction goes.

It's very early days yet, and it doesn't sound severely skewed, so I think they'll get along pretty quickly. Normally though you should give them a week or so to get used to one another without being able to directly interact, i.e. with mesh between them, to avoid various issues including cases of mistaken gender which can lead to fights to the death.

If you give all new chooks this week's introduction period, you cut down stress and hostility by a huge amount, even eradicate it, and they can be getting along like old flockmates from their first day of unimpeded interaction, since within the first week they can safely sort out a lot of things, including hierarchy and gender identification, visually (by body language alone) with the mesh between them. It's stressful to take territorial animals and suddenly introduce one into another's territory, even when you're just introducing females to males. They prefer a bit more time to get to know one another.

Best wishes.

They just got into a fight that lasted for like 15 sec but none of them backed off

alucard said:

Guys I just bought an asil hen today I already have a rooster of the same breed he has about an inch spur now the problem is that he try to dance around her but she won't even respond to him she does not run but walk away when I toss some food to them the rooster offers it to the hen the hen will come and spread her neck feather like she wants to fight him he runs away from her.I know he is not a coward one because I rescued him from a cock fight he was one hell of a fighter once now I have a question is she dominant over him or is it a normal behavior will she ever let him mate with her because I want to have some chicks from them .thanks

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Give her time.

Aseel. Keep them separate for a couple of months! Dynamics of that breed very different than with even other game breeds. If not careful you could get him killed by hen.

alucard said:

They just got into a fight that lasted for like 15 sec but none of them backed off

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No good... Did you separate them? If you did, I think it'd be best to keep them separate for a good while now, where they can see one another daily but preferably have two layers of mesh between them so they cannot hurt one another.

Basically, if they fight but neither backs off and the human intervenes and separates them for a while before reintroducing them, nothing is solved --- just postponed --- and given the chance they will soon get back to sorting it out.

The more times a third party separates two fighting birds, the worse their antagonism gets; they become more and more violent until one or both are killed. This is why I don't tolerate roosters who break up henfights, incidentally, I've seen this pattern of behavior hold true across species. Third parties do not resolve hierarchy battles between two other parties, they just make it worse.

I'd have to agree with the other two posters above, give them time. A lot more time now they've fought, and given their breed.

Best wishes.