Cream Legbars

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WOW you two must have all the lucky cards. LOL As in any breed there are always some fighters and then some lovers. All four of my male birds have been aggressive towards people when with females. I did not see the aggression when they were in pens of all males. The 6 young males now at 5 months or so are all aggressive towards each other but not the other breeds. I have only had two breeds that have been aggressive the CL's and the Buckeyes that I had. Everyone says they were such sweethearts but out of two different breeders I did not see that. Not complaining about the aggression I just have to forewarn people who take care of the stock when I am gone to beware and always face the males and do not turn your back when in certain pens.
 
Rancher3535 said:
WOW you two must have all the lucky cards. LOL As in any breed there are always some fighters and then some lovers. All four of my male birds have been aggressive towards people when with females. I did not see the aggression when they were in pens of all males. The 6 young males now at 5 months or so are all aggressive towards each other but not the other breeds. I have only had two breeds that have been aggressive the CL's and the Buckeyes that I had. Everyone says they were such sweethearts but out of two different breeders I did not see that. Not complaining about the aggression I just have to forewarn people who take care of the stock when I am gone to beware and always face the males and do not turn your back when in certain pens.
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The Cream Legbar rooster aggression discussion brought to mind Ranchhand who was one of the shining stars of BYC before she passed away...always helpful, tremendously knowledgeable, fun, funny and also down-to-earth.... Ranchhand was someone who helped make BYC forum what it is.

I got the biggest kick out of her signature - because it articulated my thoughts better than I could ---

"Poultry- they may be your pets, they may be your hobby, they may be your livestock. But remember, if you fall down in the pen, unconscious? They WILL eat you"

It was Ranchhand or someone else who talked about how in the old days, if someone was gone from the house too long -- the phrase was uttered - "maybe they fell down in the chicken pen".....

I always think that chickens aren't too far removed from dinosaurs, and that we don't need them for our survival in the food supply in the same way that the pioneers did--- So we do often think of them as pets - which may not be their best roll....

I always think of how when you raise cattle you kind of know "never to trust a bull"--- There are exceptions, but the nature of the creatures is to see us as threats and act accordingly, I think. I agree that better dispositions can be bred for and aggression is a very good reason for culling. I think that Rancher3535 has good advice to not turn your back on a rooster. I would advise someone to not turn their back on a bull in the pen - or at the least be very aware where that bull is. Roosters the same way.

Years ago - when people would say that they had children and needed a child friendly rooster -- I would say - oh Cream Legbars are great--- but now a days - I'm not sure that I think any rooster is great for a child - unless the child is raising the rooster perhaps as a 4-H project and has some pretty good awareness of what can be involved. JMO.

Regarding handling youngsters and if that makes them less fearful of humans, and thus leads them to the fight rather than the flight response when seeing humans....I wonder how that compares with roosters being prepared for the 'show circuit' where handling needs to be kind of something that they are used to - and they take it as the norm - it doesn't ruffle their feathers. Dunno. Saw an instance where a judge wouldn't 'judge' a rooster because he was too wild. Should the rooster be handled from being a chick onward...so he knows every Tuesday he gets picked up - inspected - maybe caged for a little while - given a treat and put back -- or should he be left alone until before the show and then conditioned to be in a cage and be handled. Also wondering if it is a breed tendency - the tendency of a certain strain - or the result of nurture and not nature.

At lunch today we were talking about RIR - who are notorious for being mean roosters...lots of the Folk songs about the mean red rooster are based on RIR roosters.... but other people will swear that they are the nicest sweetest and most trouble free birds they ever encountered.... what gives?
idunno.gif
 
A true Rhode Island Red is absolutely wonderful. It is the traditional hatchery RIR that turns out to be mean so unfortunately the Heritage RIR gets the bad rap for the hybrids. All breeds can have their mean males and even some females but as a rule certain breeds are notorious for mean or hyper aggressive males.
 
I think this is the classic "nurture vs nature" argument often discussed in child development... the nurture group takes the extreme that it is how the child is raised and the nature group argues the extreme it is all about how the child is biologically hardwired.

I personally have observed animals like people come with a certain amount of hardwiring predisposing them to be a certain way & I have also noted training makes a big difference to, but both "nurture" & "nature" work together to get the results you want or don't want.

When it comes to animals I find humans project Primate Human expected behaviors onto totally different species, this is a huge mistake and usually results in an out of control animal.

Nature... & Nurture...
I never allow my birds to sit on my shoulder, something allot of folks do on BYC, the reason is I learned when we kept birds such as Parrots prior to chickens it increases your risk of an aggressive bird. We think it is cute, they love us... to the bird as it matures into an adult it thinks it is on the same social level as you as it has been allowed to sit at your eye level in a perch like setting, and often this leads to it trying to establishes its self at a higher pecking order by attacking you... it is a bird thing. Now add the rooster is with hens, and his protective drive to the mix you can quickly have a problem. You can breed for many traits, including docility to humans, the general rule of aggressive chickens towards humans is those should not be bred, also hens that do not preen should be culled, and roosters should be tested to see if they preen on touch (if they do not, do not breed that bird), preening is a social behavior in birds, & a health issue. I have been spending time learning more about rooster training, which means reading things in other places, and based on what I have read, people who want well adjusted roosters, handle them daily usually for a good bit of time, and generally stew aggressive ones, but will make exceptions during breeding (pairing the rooster with hen) when they expect the rooster to be aggressive. I have also read allot on modifying rooster behavior when roos go bad. The behavior modification is always based on the way chickens think & act and not on our human ideas of what the same behaviors would mean if human.

I BTW had RIR and a good experience with them, I also would like to point out many sex-links are RIR crosses, thus can be in theory just as aggressive.

Just some thoughts.

Peace
 

I cant enlarge the pic to really tell. But they are still young they may develop one very soon.

Im relatively new to CL also so I am only going by my limited experience.
 

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