I have raised about 7 flocks of chicks,and most of the chickens from all those flocks are still around accept 1 and 2.I have kept cockerels, and pullets. I have notice through out all of these flocks of chicks from years and years around, that certain chicks will pick buddies to have face off with.And you always see the same chicks sparring. So far from what I have seen it generally is cockerel to cockerel if another young cockerel chick is around, but if not, the young cockerel chick pair off with a dominate pullet chick. Is it just two dominant ones facing off because of their positions?My RIR rooster who is now gone he did that same exact beahviour with the domiannt pullet but still turned out the 3rd lowest in line, but any other flock with an extra roo always seem to rule the roost, but seems like an extra roo gives confidence and bravery and makesthe other roos want to toughen up and fight even harder to make that top place and not be viewed as a punk?Or am I the only one experience all of this.
They are learning their place in the pecking order. The one that wins the "battle" of dominance will be above the other in the pecking order. It doesn't just happen with chicks or same sex pairs. I had a young cockerel with older hens. He had to win his place to the top of the pecking order one hen at a time.
Hi there TheTwoRoos I have seen this behaviour with my little ones also. In one hatch I had what turned out to be two little roosters continually sparring with each other and the two that turned out to be little girls just ignored them. In another hatch all of them were practicing their sparring and bouncing off each other, regardless of gender. I think it is funny when they get a bit carried away and start in on mumma hen; she sure does put them in their place quick smart
I think it is between brood mates of close rank. I do not think I have seen highest ranking and lowest ranking face off like that unless only two birds in brood.
I ahve senn worst fighting between chicks rather then just the normal eye peckind chest bumping and scrarching,kicking.I hsd a cockeral and a pullet who opposed as a cockeral up until about 4 months but at about 7 or 9 weeks her and her brother had a HUGE fall out.At this time I had no idea what to di but let them fight.They acrually drew lots if blood and adventually the cockeral did something odd with the pullets eye and made it bleed and scab over,ever since that pont her eye was by far the ugliest eye I think i had ever seen adventually the scab fell iff but the eye was just wrinkly,she never faught tha cockeral again,maybe it was due to them being the only 2 left if the batch and were hatched out and raised by an actual mother.
My pullet group did quite a bit of feet up sparring this year....more when they were older tho, about 3-4 months. A lot of it looked more like fooling around rather than a real pecking order fight.
