Half Roo but lays eggs?

astrologica

In the Brooder
5 Years
We hatched 28 peeps around May 20 2015 and 23 survived our newbie mistakes (moisture buildup...respiratory illness).
At 3 months we were confident that all the roos were plain to see so we advertised them in the local Valley Trader.
We kept what we thought we 13 hens and 2 roos. Cut to 5 months of age and one of the hens started getting bigger than the others and then developing sickle feathers. I read on this site that it can happen when there is a hormone imbalance. Now today, my fiancé thinks he laid an egg. I'm hoping it was the hen that was also around that area that maybe came back when honey accidentally chased her up. Bruci (the name of the roo that I named after Bruce Jenner), was on the nest and came back after honey chased him away. He's definitely on the bottom of the roo pecking order and even has hens pick fights with him. I'm hoping he didn't actually lay the egg. That would be strange but many strange things happen here. His comb and waddles are the same size as the hens, I don't think he's crowed yet and I can't remember if I've seen spurs developing on him or not. I will check in the morning for sure. This all happened about 20 minutes before I left for my night shift job.
Thoughts?
 
We hatched 28 peeps around May 20 2015 and 23 survived our newbie mistakes (moisture buildup...respiratory illness).
At 3 months we were confident that all the roos were plain to see so we advertised them in the local Valley Trader.
We kept what we thought we 13 hens and 2 roos. Cut to 5 months of age and one of the hens started getting bigger than the others and then developing sickle feathers. I read on this site that it can happen when there is a hormone imbalance. Now today, my fiancé thinks he laid an egg. I'm hoping it was the hen that was also around that area that maybe came back when honey accidentally chased her up. Bruci (the name of the roo that I named after Bruce Jenner), was on the nest and came back after honey chased him away. He's definitely on the bottom of the roo pecking order and even has hens pick fights with him. I'm hoping he didn't actually lay the egg. That would be strange but many strange things happen here. His comb and waddles are the same size as the hens, I don't think he's crowed yet and I can't remember if I've seen spurs developing on him or not. I will check in the morning for sure. This all happened about 20 minutes before I left for my night shift job.
Thoughts?


Pictures of the chicken will help a lot.
 
LL

He's definitely a cockerel. When several cockerels are raised together, there always seems to be some that develop more slowly. Whether this is due to a lack of hormones to begin with or whether the dominant cockerels (with lots of hormones) somehow inhibit the growth of the subordinate birds, I do not know. Chance are, if you were to get rid of your other males, this one would begin crowing quite soon. With 2 above him in the hierarchy, he may never crow.

Spurs do not typically develop until after 1 year. I suspect his male coloring (red on the wings) was evident from an early age, but if you are new to chickens, you could have missed it easily. My first impression was that he is a male EE (Easter Egger- did you hatch any green or blue eggs?), an Ameraucana cross, but missing the usual beard and muffs on the face and with white legs instead of the typical green. Ameraucanas have peas combs, smaller and less obvious than single combs and they do not have wattles, which you generally don't notice because the face and throat are covered with feathers. His comb still looks underdeveloped for his age.

I'm quite sure he did not lay an egg. He's hanging with the pullets to keep safe from the big boys or to sneak in a little action without them seeing!
yippiechickie.gif
 

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