Rooster starting to get aggressive

[ChickyWhicky]

Dirtbag roosters go in the freezer. No reason to risk your safety.
Can he be "trained" or age out of it, maybe. Sometimes they are just plain mean and no technique or method breaks it. Your choices are to try to cope and wait it out (maybe try the taming methods at your own risk) or cull him. No sense in rehomimg a safety hazard. Good luck!

 

[LaFleche]

This often happens when chicks that were raised by humans become hormonal and see their human caretakers as equals and in case of attacking them as a rival to their pullets attention.

All the good intentioned advice regarding the taming and rehabilitation of human aggressive males will rarely work in case the bird in question was raised by humans from day old chick with no adult birds around to teach them manners. Their hormonally inundated brain will not rewire just because we want it to.

With you being new chicken owners, I would advise to invite him to dinner. Aggressive cockerels taste best.

You rarely ever see a cockerel that was raised by a momma hen in a multigenerational flock attack their human caretakers.

 

[Tired old Rooster]

First off clothing. Always wear sturdy footwear and trousers. For heavens sake not flip flops or open toed sandals, or even your hens will be teaching you how to tap dance.

Running away is a huge no no, because you just got owned. (sturdy clothes negate that need).

He is a tyke who is just starting to get hormonal. You need to set the relationship with him. Remember, they are HIS hens, not yours. He is the boss of the flock and you are that big thing that brings him tasty stuff he can bribe hens with. remember, bribery usually works better than coercion.

You also need to be patient. As he grows up, many changes will happen and he will likely calm down.

If at a year old, he is still trouble, I hear that year old roosters are extra tasty, so not all is lost. If he washes out, let the hens get to adulthood and try again with a young cockerel that the older hens can set on the right path.

 

[LaFleche]

Maybe look into @Shadrach 's article as well: https://www.backyardchickens.com/articles/understanding-your-rooster.75056/

 

[GirlsHuntToo]

With Rhode Island reds it depends on the rooster. I had two that were aggressive but I have one right now he is 3 years old and he loves himself some cuddles and loves to be petted and follow me around - but when you buy Rhode Island Red roosters from a hatchery they say most are aggressive.

 

[Bananabread]

An aggressive rooster will completely sap the fun out of your experience and your families and possibly compromise your relationship with all of the chickens. I recommend salt and pepper

 

[ssferret]

Apparently there are as many different ways to try to tame roosters.

Here's an article by Bitchin' Chickens that helped me.

This article talks about why a rooster most likely becomes a "bully" when interacting with people. In my case I actually tried this on a rooster that had what you could say was the opposite problem. He was aggressive to his girls but not people. I couldn't believe this actually worked.

 

[SE_Gardener]

I keep two breeding flocks and everyone gets along. I've only had two roosters that met the processing cones in nearly 10 yrs. I hatch 40-50+ eggs per year but don't really dawdle over the chicks. I do handle them when I weigh each week and make it a point to be slow and deliberative avoiding sudden movements. I do speak to them training them to my voice and do call them at each feeding For those chicks that are blended back into the breeding flock I don't spend a lot of time with the chickens, they are not pets but harvestable eggs and raise for meat. Both roosters were handled/treated the same as others but around the 20week point hormones start to build and breeding the hens becomes a priority for the rooster. The most recent rooster (last year) was quite friendly as a cockrel but it was like a switch that went off and he was constantly flapping his wings to let me know he was in charge. I never turn my back on a rooster but if I did, he would have charged me. I live in the south and heat/humidity make for two rounds of mites so dusting is a routine - no chicken likes being dusted. I separate the hens in two small groups and bring one group out of the run into a small narrow temp fenced area to free range and use a couple wire panels to herd the hens to one end and one by one I dust them and then return them to their pens one at a time. Typically it's no big deal. There's always a cry baby hen in the bunch and that set the rooster off. When I returned with that hen to her pen, the rooster charged me. He became human aggressive when his protective instinct got out of line. His aggressiveness continued unto I was not able to enter the pen. He then began bullying the rooster in the next pen - I had to put up a 3ft high privacy screen between the pens. That rooster simply became disruptive to both breed flocks, egg product was impacted as well. At that point I waited till 11:00 pm went into the coop with a flashlight and removed him. I kept him overnight in a wire dog crate and processed him the next morning. I won't tolerate an aggressive rooster. I know people claim to "train" them, but once a rooster comes at you and flies at you with claws held straight out, there's no de-escalating that behavior. In my experience the short period those two roosters' behaviors escalated and pushed me to dispatch then, there was impact on the hens which requires extra effort to regain their trust. unless you're breeding, I encourage flock owners to not own a rooster. Chicks are too easy to access and the hens are much more docile without the rooster constantly wanting to mount them.