Desexing rooster?

[Kabraham54]

I have eight 13 week old birds and one is looking like a rooster. Does anyone castrate their roosters? Does it make them nicer? Do they still act as guardians to the hens? I’d love to keep him because he is especially beautiful!

 

[The Moonshiner]

Why would you think about castrating him?

 

[nuthatched]

He's too old for the surgery, which is done without anesthetic. It won't garentee him to not crow or mate.

 

[FrostRanger]

I'd speak to your local avian vet about it. At that age, nothing is guaranteed, but if you want to go down that road, you will need a vet's assistance. In addition to surgery I do know that it's possible to chemically castrate a cockerel. The only thing is it may affect your ability to eat him (although that doesn't seem to be your plan anyways). Whether it's worth it or not in your case, I couldn't say, but I'd lean towards probably not, but if it's indeed your desire to caponize him, then you'll want to get on finding a vet to help with that immediately although you might have a tough time of it as it's hard enough to find a vet who sees chickens at all and I couldn't tell you how expensive it'd be

 

[Mrs. K]

Yes people do castrate their roosters. It can be done, but to keep him from crowing, it has to be done very early. I think you are past that point.

 

[JacinLarkwell]

It also makes them incredibly mellow if successful, like prone to bullying hens in the flock at times based on accounts I've seen

 

[Susan Skylark]

You’ll have to look long and hard to find a vet that can castrate a rooster! The learning curve is atrocious and there isn’t a huge demand for it so it will certainly be a specialty skill! Professional caponizers can demand $75 an hour (but can process a ton of birds).

 

[BigBlueHen53]

A rooster's gonads are inside the body cavity under the ribcage, they are not external and readily accessible as in mammals. Unless you take him to a professional caponizer that has done hundreds or thousands of birds, your rooster likely won't survive the procedure.

 

[Rock17]

It is cruel imo since it is usually very painful and sometimes fatal.

 

[Rock17]

It also defeats the purpose of having a rooster