Moving chicks to the outdoor coop at 8 weeks - questions on roosters

[navyman93944]

First time poster here, sorry if this is in the wrong spot. We decided to massively grow our flock this year, from 3 up to 27. The new chicks are 8 weeks old and we are going to move them out to the main coop with our original 3 girls this weekend. We bought a dozen Olive Egger females and a dozen Ameraucana and Mystic Marans as a straight run. We know that we will have some roosters here and we want to keep a few of them. I have a few questions about roosters and the answers I find seem to be all over the map.

Can we keep any number of roosters we have from that straight run and all in the same coop? For example if we end up with 8 roosters then we would have 19 hens with them. Some people say they have no issues mixing any number up, but we were thinking to only keep 2-3 roosters max. If they cant all stay in the same coop, then we would need to remove them since we only have the one coop.

Moving them out to the coop...since we really arent sure which ones are roosters yet, and trying to figure it out based on the various google ways to do so seems impossible at 8 weeks, will it be fine to put them all out there together and weed out excess roosters later (assuming we cant just keep them all?) We could hold a few of the ones we are pretty sure are roosters (a few we have watched crowing like crazy! is this even 100% rooster guarantee at 8 weeks?) I assume they dont really start doing 'rooster' stuff til closer to 18-20 weeks, but we really dont want them in the garage this long.

Thanks for any tips/advice

 

[azygous]

There is one important fact about cockerels and roosters you need to keep in mind when you're deciding how many to keep, and half those chicks are likely to be cockerels, by the way.

Once the cockerels start to get their hormones, and it can be much earlier than you think. I had a six-week old cockerel mounting the six-week old pullets and he even emitted a squeaky little crow. Not only will they be annoying and stressing the pullets, they will also likely be fighting one another. You can look forward to a very unpeaceful flock, and much earlier than you thought.

The best thing you can do right now is to create separate quarters for the sexes. In fact, keeping a bachelor coop and run is the best thing you can do for your chickens, and then supervising when to permit hens and roosters to mingle.

Early on, I discovered that any time two or more roosters have access to the hens, the roosters engage in fighting. This is far from entertaining. Real injuries occur, and I was getting weary of patching up the injuries after these fights. So I had another coop built just for the roosters along with its own run. Hens and roosters free range separately, too, as I'm not interested in dealing with the fights, and I only have just two roosters for eighteen hens.

 

[mcdze]

your not gonna want more than two, and then only for redundancy so if something happens to one you arnt out of business .. extra roosters are just mouths to feed that serve no purpose unless you want to have a few chicken dinners onhand lol .. you can ask around to see if anyone will take them, or if you can identify them early when theyre just a couple weeks old you can simply turn them out in the yard, something will take care of them for you ..

 

[jmac11]

So, I am getting ready to merge 10 week old pullets with 14 week old pullets (there are also two 14 week old cockerals.) Both groups have been sleeping in separate compartments in the coop and have been in a side by side run during the day for 2 weeks and will do so for 2 more weeks. I feel like I should move the cockerals to a separate location when merging the flock. I'd like to eliminate fighting and unwanted mounting. If I do that, when can I let the cockerals rejoin the group?

 

[azygous]

Cockerels don't have to be quartered with the hens. My two roosters have their own bachelor quarters, and they only occasionally get to fraternize with the hens. I do this because they fight each other each and every time they get access to the hens.

 

[jmac11]

Cockerels don't have to be quartered with the hens. My two roosters have their own bachelor quarters, and they only occasionally get to fraternize with the hens. I do this because they fight each other each and every time they get access to the hens.

That's what I'm afraid I'll have to do which means getting another coop. We just finished our build 2 weeks ago, and I didn't plan for a separate area for the roosters. My husband thinks I should get rid of them, but I've raised them from babies. It's not their fault they turned out to be roos. :[
I'm trying to convince my husband that a chicken village would be very cute!

 

[azygous]

How about a bunch of cute little A-frames like in an alpine village? You wouldn't be the first to add a coop to solve a growing rooster population. That is, in fact, how I came to have a second coop with its own run going off at ninety degrees from the main run. It's worked out remarkably well over the years. You'll be glad of the additional infrastructure over the following years, and when roosters are quartered together separately from the hens, the boys do get along much better with far fewer fights.

 

[SummerTheAnimalGirl]

if you can identify them early when theyre just a couple weeks old you can simply turn them out in the yard, something will take care of them for you ..

I, uh, hope you don’t mean that…