I've recently acquired 4 Dorking hens and a rooster who were supposed to be about a year old. Its very evident they are older than that, based on the maturity of the rooster and sized of his spurs. And at least one hen has some male characteristics. One hen in particular is pretty weird though. Aside from having spurs (there is another "normal" hen among this group also with spurs... I'm not considering that all too abnormal based on the breed), she also has the flatter back, wider and heavier body of a rooster. Her feathering is mostly female, but she has many randomly dispersed iridescent greenish blue rooster-like body feathers. Normal hen neck and tail feathers, and the rest of the body feathers normal sg dorking hen-like. And this morning she greeting the day crowing! Since I didn't want her in my breeding program and my daughter wished to take home a few chickens, she offered to take my "hermaphrodite" hen, as shes been calling her, along with my non bearded silkie. I keep telling my daughter the hen is not a hermaphrodite, i think shes just getting older and has high testosterone. This morning I got a text at 6 a.m. "I told you she was a hermaphrodite, still no eggs and she's crowing!". ( still no eggs is no big deal... this is only the second day she's lived there!) I've heard of older hens having higher testosterone. I assumed it was a case of her being older than advertised. I've also heard of mosaic gynandromorphs, though. Is there any way to tell which or what is going on here? I do not know if she's ever laid an egg here as this is the first we've seperated her out. Is there a reliable way to guess the age of a chicken? Her spurs are way too big and body way too heavy to be younger than advertised, so I'm positive this isn't just a late blooming cockerel.
