Bullying? Bad roo? Peck order fighting?

[Ridgerunner]

My EE rooster has always mated with all my hens except one, my white EE. ..... Then one day I saw him catch up to her and pull out feather from her back. Then I saw him catch her and she finally submitted, he mounted her but instead of mating with her he just pecked her head and eventually let her go. I also noticed my partridge rock hen (also on the bottom of the pecking order) go after her once..... my daughter saw the rooster and my partridge rock going after her..... What are your thoughts? Peck order fighting? Problem rooster? Other issues?

This is not a pecking order fight. The pecking order has long been settled. Problem rooster? Your partridge rock is not a rooster. Bullying? Any chicken can be a bully if they are with a weaker chicken but some can be more vicious than others. They are about 9 months old. They should be acting like mature chickens but some are slow to mature. Is that white EE laying eggs yet?

I don't know what is going on. It sounds like she has always run from him since adolescence instead of submitting. It could have something to do with maturity levels, hers or his but both should be beyond that by now. She may not accept his dominance as flock master for whatever reasons and he is trying to beat her into submission. He may just not like her, I've seen that between two chickens before. Sometimes if a chicken is perceived as weak the others may try to run her out of the flock. A sick or injured chicken can attract predators so the instinctive reaction is to get her away from the flock. Sometimes they kill the weak ones because of that. Lots of different things could be going on. Your rock hen may be joining in just because she can and may be OK as long as he is not there as an instigator or she may be a problem. It's not that unusual for a hen very low in the pecking order to bully others even lower, as if she is jealous of her position and wants to make sure she doesn't get pushed even lower.

My suggestion is to observe the flock while she is healing and not there and see how peaceful the flock is. After she heals put her back with the flock but isolate him for a week or more away from the flock. See how peaceful the flock is without him. Then put him back with them and see what happens. Make your decisions on what you see happening, not what some stranger like me over the internet tells you will happen. I know it is pretty common on this forum to always blame the male, males are evil and always the cause of the problem, but I've been known to sometimes solve these problems by removing the girls, not the boys. Sometimes I do remove boys. I don't keep individual chickens, I keep a flock that has replaceable parts. My goal is to keep that flock as peaceful as I can.

 

[Jemdeenie]

Sometimes a rooster just doesn't like a hen or sometimes there is an issue with her that we as humans can't see that would make her detrimental to the flock.
Not playing devils advocate here but it isn't always the rooster being a psycho although it sure looks that way to us.

Thank you for your input. Yea, there is definitely something going between the rooster and her but I agree with you it isn't necessarily him. I closely checked over the other hens today and most do have some very small patches of feathers missing on their heads and the partridge rock has a bunch off her back. But none of them have any wounds. I would think that a few little spots on the head are normal given the way they mate.

 

[Jemdeenie]

This is not a pecking order fight. The pecking order has long been settled. Problem rooster? Your partridge rock is not a rooster. Bullying? Any chicken can be a bully if they are with a weaker chicken but some can be more vicious than others. They are about 9 months old. They should be acting like mature chickens but some are slow to mature. Is that white EE laying eggs yet?

I don't know what is going on. It sounds like she has always run from him since adolescence instead of submitting. It could have something to do with maturity levels, hers or his but both should be beyond that by now. She may not accept his dominance as flock master for whatever reasons and he is trying to beat her into submission. He may just not like her, I've seen that between two chickens before. Sometimes if a chicken is perceived as weak the others may try to run her out of the flock. A sick or injured chicken can attract predators so the instinctive reaction is to get her away from the flock. Sometimes they kill the weak ones because of that. Lots of different things could be going on. Your rock hen may be joining in just because she can and may be OK as long as he is not there as an instigator or she may be a problem. It's not that unusual for a hen very low in the pecking order to bully others even lower, as if she is jealous of her position and wants to make sure she doesn't get pushed even lower.

My suggestion is to observe the flock while she is healing and not there and see how peaceful the flock is. After she heals put her back with the flock but isolate him for a week or more away from the flock. See how peaceful the flock is without him. Then put him back with them and see what happens. Make your decisions on what you see happening, not what some stranger like me over the internet tells you will happen. I know it is pretty common on this forum to always blame the male, males are evil and always the cause of the problem, but I've been known to sometimes solve these problems by removing the girls, not the boys. Sometimes I do remove boys. I don't keep individual chickens, I keep a flock that has replaceable parts. My goal is to keep that flock as peaceful as I can.

Thanks for your response. Yes, the pecking order was established long ago, but I was wondering if removing the broody cochin might have led to a need for establishing a new pecking order? I wonder if when she returns if things could settle down. Yes, the white EE is laying well. She seems as mature as the rest but she is thinner, her body shapeis more like a bird than a chicken, she has a long tail. She seems very healthy, alert, friendly, and she seems to get along with the other hens except for that one time with the partridge rock.

I'm not wanting to jump the gun on getting rid of the rooster. I enjoy roosters and like watching their antics. He and I get along fine anyway I'll do what seems best for the flock whenever I figure out what that is.

Thank you for your suggestion of alternately removing and observing, that makes a lot of sense. I was thinking if that, but I think I was needing encouragement to be patient and not act in haste. They are usually very nice to each other when I'm around but I will try doing more extended observations and a different times. I like your goal of a peaceful flock. That is my goal too. I thought we had that, but either things have changed or maybe there was always an issue brewing that I missed and it just escalated for some reason.

 

[aart]

I had the flock cock target a hen once, he was after her all the time and would beat her if he could catch her.
Luckily there's lots of space for her to get away, and eventually the conflict seemed to end.

 

[Chickassan]

Yep, I had issues with an absolutely terrific rooster too.
He roughed up a hen that would rather fight him than submit and this went on for years, she eventually gave in and became his favorite.
Second issue he out the blue repeatedly scalped his daughter, targeted her beelined every time she healed up.
I rehomed her, he was too good to lose over something I couldn't possibly understand not being fluent in chicken.