Cockerel or Capon? I've decided!

[chickbea]

OK - after much agonizing I've decided not to caponize my little cockerel. I hope I won't be sorry!
I have to admit to a life-long prejudice against roos; I think they're needlessly noisy, and they mess with the girls' beautiful feathers. This may have come from an inordinately noisy rooster that lived down the road from me growing up - that beastie started in crowing at about 4:00 AM. Now here I've fallen in love with little Edward, and I don't know what to do! I've decided against caponizing because I heard too many horror stories (even from vets), and I figure if I'm going to have a male, I might as well do it right.
A couple questions - since I've never owned a roo before...
I've been told that they become better and more impressive crowers if they have older roos around to imitate. Does that mean they may stay on the quiet side if they don't have competition, or is that wishful thinking on my part?

Edward is a little over ten weeks right now, and hardly makes a sound. When he does, he peeps like a baby chick, which is funny, because his sisters are starting to get their adult voices.

 

[4H kids and mom]

Well, I can tell you from my experience. Though ours are still too young to crow, our nearest neighbor (and ONLY neighbor!) has a few free range hens and one roo. He took them in as rescues back during the Katrina crisis. They were babies when he took them so the roo hadnt been around other roos. He is really quiet. He does crow sometimes during the day, but only a few times at a time. I actually enjoy it. He crows around 6:30am but we're all up at that hour anyway and the kids like saying that he's "waking up the sun". Other than that, its really quiet. I know certain breeds are known to be louder. I've heard leghorns are major crowers, and that some of the fancier breeds are quieter...though I dont know for certain if this is true. The farmer across the way's roo is an Ameraucana like ours.

 

[Marion]

My RIR rooster had no other roos around to learn to crow from but he has a wonderful voice! He mostly waits until we are up and about before he starts crowing (5AM) and will sometimes crow during the day but he is not a bit obnoxious and we enjoy his voice! I would say that he is quiet the majority of the day other than the morning greeting... he also has not seemed to have messed up any of the ladies' feathers a bit... enjoy your Edward!

 

[chickbea]

I hope Edward turns out to be a gentleman!

 

[SpottedCrow]

Me too!
Glad you decided against the operation...

 

[silkiechicken]

I find more roos the more crowing... or that may just be because there are more roos....

If one of my roos starts crowing, so does all the other ones.