Just how useful is a rooster anyway?

[CannedMonster]

My Bantam roo gave his life for the girls when 2 neighborhood dogs got in my yard. I keep a Bantam with the big hens, he's not as loud, not agressive and does keep a watch out. Japanese Bantams rock.

I like to keep bantam roos too.
Often they won’t damage the hens feathers at all and they’re perfectly able to keep watch and warn the flock.
Unfortunately two of my bantam roos died of unknown illness and right now I have a big Naked Neck and an Australorp.
If anything happens to those two I’ll probably replace them with bantam roosters.

 

[Heidi52]

My Big Lazy Rooster hid behind the hens when anything attacked. Totally useless for protection. The only reason to put up with them is if you want to have fertilized eggs, but if you hatch them out you will end up with 50-50 roosters/hens. Not worth it to me. No more roosters and I've tried them more times than I should have.

 

[Colvinwe]

I just got rid of a rooster that was too protective of his flock -- he decided that I was a threat. I keep a couple of roosters because my egg customers prefer fertile eggs. I don't keep any rooster that becomes aggressive, because I have young grandchildren.

 

[standish]

We've had a rooster for years with free-ranging hens, and I think they generally do help protect the hens from predators by "keeping watch" and "sounding the alarm." Roosters are always much more wary than hens.

Furthermore, hens do like their rooster. I think they're definitely happier with a rooster around, and we see real affection between hens and roosters. For example, about a month ago our rooster got sick and would not climb up to sleep on the roosting poles. He slept in a nest on the floor for several days, and a hen stayed down with him. He got better, by the way.

 

[Creature lover]

Hi all,

I've posted a few times about my back and forth thinking regarding keeping a rooster that showed up in our first order of sexed chicks. We ended up with four hens and a RIR rooster. There were a lot of up and down moments, but in the end our observation seemed to be that our little flock was well enough balanced and we figured the rooster provided some extra protection for our free ranging birds.

Thing is, I've been of the mind lately that our rooster actually doesn't do much protecting. We got a dog about two months ago, and while she is always leashed, she loves to make hopeless runs at the curious hens who always show up around us when we go outside. I couldn't help but notice that the rooster seemed unperturbed and also would turn and scoot when the dog showed anything resembling aggression.

Then this morning, as I sat at the breakfast table shortly after letting the flock out of the coop, I heard an almighty commotion. I turned around just in time to see perhaps the most beautiful fox I've ever seen in the wild gleefully chasing my flock through the yard. Everything happened pretty quickly - the dog was thrown into its pen, I ran barefoot into the yard yelling, and chickens were flying everywhere - but a lasting impression was the rooster, far ahead of his flailing hens, hightailing it behind the house. Luckily, no damage was done besides a few ruffled feathers.

When things had calmed down and I went to reassure the hens that all was well again, I found the rooster, as always, mounting his girls. And I just thought, you useless, cowardly creature. You haven't earned that right.

So does this sound like an inordinately ineffective bird? Or is this just par for the course? We put up with the rooster's noise, the girls put up with his insatiable sex drive, and for what? (For what it's worth, to balance the flock more we are adding an additional 4-5 laying hens in June).

I think

Hi all,

I've posted a few times about my back and forth thinking regarding keeping a rooster that showed up in our first order of sexed chicks. We ended up with four hens and a RIR rooster. There were a lot of up and down moments, but in the end our observation seemed to be that our little flock was well enough balanced and we figured the rooster provided some extra protection for our free ranging birds.

Thing is, I've been of the mind lately that our rooster actually doesn't do much protecting. We got a dog about two months ago, and while she is always leashed, she loves to make hopeless runs at the curious hens who always show up around us when we go outside. I couldn't help but notice that the rooster seemed unperturbed and also would turn and scoot when the dog showed anything resembling aggression.

Then this morning, as I sat at the breakfast table shortly after letting the flock out of the coop, I heard an almighty commotion. I turned around just in time to see perhaps the most beautiful fox I've ever seen in the wild gleefully chasing my flock through the yard. Everything happened pretty quickly - the dog was thrown into its pen, I ran barefoot into the yard yelling, and chickens were flying everywhere - but a lasting impression was the rooster, far ahead of his flailing hens, hightailing it behind the house. Luckily, no damage was done besides a few ruffled feathers.

When things had calmed down and I went to reassure the hens that all was well again, I found the rooster, as always, mounting his girls. And I just thought, you useless, cowardly creature. You haven't earned that right.

So does this sound like an inordinately ineffective bird? Or is this just par for the course? We put up with the rooster's noise, the girls put up with his insatiable sex drive, and for what? (For what it's worth, to balance the flock more we are adding an additional 4-5 laying hens in June).

 

[Creature lover]

I think you need to have that one for supper and get a good rooster. Several times I will hear ours making a ruckus and find the girls all standing behind him while he has his eye to the sky. It’s a pretty cool sight how they all know what to do! I feel ours would be a good protector but he is the first to not set foot outside if it snows! He’s the biggest wimp with snow but then again maybe he is protecting the girls from a ‘falling sky’!
The downside of having a good protector is he has gone after my husband a couple times and my husband has had to show him who’s boss!

 

[RottyChicDog]

YES! 100% this. I've found my best roosters after I raised youngsters with the flock. My percentage of jerks has gone down tremendously once I got a good rooster to school them. Of course, some breeds are better than others. Never had a good rooster that was part Dominique or RIR. The OP is very lucky so far if all her RIR is bad at is protecting hens.

I have a Barred Plymouth Rock Rooster and a RIR rooster, I had to take the RIR out of the flock because he was severely beating up the BPR rooster and some of the hens. I had read that RIRs are known to be aggressive and he was supposed to be a female as I would not have purchased a RIR rooster on purpose. I have heard stories of heroic roosters but mine give alarm calls and take the girls to safety which is all I ask for. The RIR lives in his own coop outside the fenced area for my free range flock.

 

[Treatment Guy]

We had a rooster we liked named Elvis. Unfortunately he got sick and died. When spring comes we are going to get another one. When the flock was outside (6 hens and Elvis) he did seem to keep them together more often, but not always. However it was in the cold weather when Elvis shined. He made sure all the hens got up on the high roost at night, even the lowest hen in the pecking order, and he pushed them together for shared warmth.

 

[Whitney B]

Hi all,

I've posted a few times about my back and forth thinking regarding keeping a rooster that showed up in our first order of sexed chicks. We ended up with four hens and a RIR rooster. There were a lot of up and down moments, but in the end our observation seemed to be that our little flock was well enough balanced and we figured the rooster provided some extra protection for our free ranging birds.

Thing is, I've been of the mind lately that our rooster actually doesn't do much protecting. We got a dog about two months ago, and while she is always leashed, she loves to make hopeless runs at the curious hens who always show up around us when we go outside. I couldn't help but notice that the rooster seemed unperturbed and also would turn and scoot when the dog showed anything resembling aggression.

Then this morning, as I sat at the breakfast table shortly after letting the flock out of the coop, I heard an almighty commotion. I turned around just in time to see perhaps the most beautiful fox I've ever seen in the wild gleefully chasing my flock through the yard. Everything happened pretty quickly - the dog was thrown into its pen, I ran barefoot into the yard yelling, and chickens were flying everywhere - but a lasting impression was the rooster, far ahead of his flailing hens, hightailing it behind the house. Luckily, no damage was done besides a few ruffled feathers.

When things had calmed down and I went to reassure the hens that all was well again, I found the rooster, as always, mounting his girls. And I just thought, you useless, cowardly creature. You haven't earned that right.

So does this sound like an inordinately ineffective bird? Or is this just par for the course? We put up with the rooster's noise, the girls put up with his insatiable sex drive, and for what? (For what it's worth, to balance the flock more we are adding an additional 4-5 laying hens in June).

I've had a few mixed experiences with roosters, I've had some really dumb ones, a couple like yours (all which have been butchered), but now I have 3 really good ones. One sacrificed himself to a hawk that kept picking off our flock. Another a tiny banty, tried doing same with the neighbors dog. Poor lil guy he really tried tearing that huge dog up. And my lead rooster fought off a Fox that was chasing his hens. Got a rip in his waddle, but made it out good. So if I were you I'd just butcher him if your not happy with him and maybe try again.

 

[angela0408]

What is it exactly you expect from your rooster?
I think your getting behavior you might wish from from a boyfriend, or husband confused with another species.
Of course he runs from a fox. He's not stupid!
Did you notice if he gave a warning call to his hens?
Do you think he should fight the fox? Seems like a rather unequal match to me.
Roosters are not equipped to fight predators. they are equipped to fight each other.
Honestly, words fail me.

Wow, sometimes I think our members here are a little harsh. Probably could have phrased this a little gentler. We’re not all experts here and come when we’re seekin advice and help, not to be shamed and made to feel bad.