My husband and personally let our rooster free range, however we do leave a barn open for him to go in if he wants. He loves it! We also let's our chicks free range all day, then put them in the barn at night if their not already in the coopI have way too many roosters right now, due to all of the hatching I and my hens have done last fall. I can't seem to find homes for these roos. I've advertised them for free, and even offered to throw in a hen or two if someone takes these roos, and no one wants them! They only want my hens, which I really don't want to part with anyway.
I have an idea. I do allow my chickens to free-range at times. I've even left the coop door open all night and never lost a bird (thanks to my livestock guardian dog!). The coop door has blown shut already before nightfall and my whole flock had to spend the night outdoors. Everyone knew to get up in the trees to roost for the night.
My idea is to keep the roosters that I want in the coop with the hens full-time and kick the extra roosters outside to be full-time free range roosters. My coop wouldn't be over-crowded, my hens would be safe, and I'd still have birds outside to scratch in the horse poop and eat the bugs and ticks! If I lose one to a predator, no great loss, at least its not a good laying hen. The roosters have plenty of safe places to roost at night, and can bunk inside with the goats in the winter.
Does that sound like a plan, or am I terrible for doing such a thing?
*UPDATE* I actually managed to re-home several of my roosters, but I had to throw in a few hens to sweeten the deal in order to get rid of them all! I still have four roosters, all of which I'd like to keep for breeding purposes, but my rooster to hen ratio is still out of whack.
I have two big EE roosters, and really only need one, but don't have the heart to get rid of either of them since one is my husband's buddy, and the other I raised from a chick and just don't want to see him go.
Can I throw my one big roo outside the pen and let him free-range alone? Would that be terrible since he wouldn't have access to the hens all the time and would only be able to interact with the rest of the flock occasionally, when I allow them to free-range? I have a second bantam rooster that I could free-range to keep the other company. Would one or two free-range roosters be okay?
