freezer time for some roos, which goes and which stays?

[Picotine]

i have 12 barred rock, 2 turned out to be hens and 10 roosters. we're thinking about keeping 2 roosters with our hens and getting rid of the other 8. they are not show bird, just commercial grade but i'd still like to cultivate them to have a nice flock. we're taking them to be butchered in the morning, so i don't have much time left to make up my mind which one goes and which one stays. it was rainy today so i didn't get to see them much to ponder about it some more.

i've heard a few crow so far, some sound good, some stop mid sentence like if they were choking on their words...
- one has curly toes and lop sided wattle, so no debate on that one, he'll go.
- one i call my friendly giant, i believe he's my biggest, has an extra row of wing feather that started to grow ahead of the others but i have no idea what he sounds like. his plumage is on the darker side for a rooster and his tail is not the showiest. (thinking of keeping this one)
- the one who sings the best seem to also be a descent size but he has one of the funniest tail. low and bushy with only 4 feather sticking upward and curling toward his head. he also seem to be the alpha. his plumage is on the lighter side. (thinking of keeping this one)
- there's one that has a black with greenish hue feather in his tail. he's smaller and i'm wondering if it's natural of a barred rock to have greenish tail feathers?
the rest are either smaller or i haven't found them any distinctive trait to identify them.

our 1 priority is eggs, but if they can hatch some chicks, the extras (above replacement rate) would be freezer meat so i'm hoping that the larger roosters would help produce larger offsprings.
looks might be nice but i don't want to grit my teeth every time i hear the roosters crow either. not everyone will see my chickens but i'm sure they'll hear him for at least half a mile around. they're just about reaching their 18 week, are their tail feather still going to evolve, is there anything else i should consider? or am i going about it all the wrong ways? i don't want to have to feed that many rooster for any longer then needed and if the hens are about to lay any day now, 10 roosters is probably more stressful on them too. so although it might be tempting to postpone the visit to the butcher one more week, should i bother agonizing that much longer about which one to pick?

Thanks in advance for any advices you can afford me. it's my first time having to cull my flock and i'm afraid to make the wrong choice.

 

[daver]

I don't think I would agonize in your situation, just do it.

We had ten, half males. It was chaos until the male population was reduced. Especially at 18 to 20 weeks.

Dave

 

[Hollywood Hen]

Keep the ones with the nicest personalities. I wouldn't worry as much about looks or how loud they are - if they're still young that can change a lot as they age.

Also, are the two hens the only ones you have? Two roosters might be pretty hard on them...I'd probably just keep one.

 

[remuda1]

Quote:
X2. Two roosters for two hens will be very hard on the hens, even one roo for two hens is asking for trouble and miserable hens, in my opinion. You DEF. want to keep the one that will be a gentleman to the girls.

 

[Picotine]

Quote:
yes,they are the only 2 hens we have but we're planning on getting more in the spring as our original goal is to have 12 hens... our kids eat a lot of eggs. there might be a bit of pecking here and there but so far, i find that they are pretty much all quite well behaved. when i asked the guy who sold us the chickens if i should keep only one, he said that it would be better to keep two, that it happen often that one get killed because they place themselves between the hen and a predator. i figured it would be tougher to introduce a young cockerel later if i only keep one now. i'm also starting to consider adding a bit of variety instead of just getting 10 more barred rock hens. the farmer that raises them also raises rhode island red and delawares. he mentioned getting into 2 more breed by the spring. one of them being silver laced wyandotte. can't remember what the other one is.

 

[Picotine]

we drove our roosters away this morning to be processed. we only need to pick em up saturday when we go to the farmer's market. i'm glad i don't have to do the killing myself but i found out the price went up. it was around $3.50 when i first asked and it's now $4.25

kinda cuts into the savings of raising them ourselves. i might ask around if anyone else can do it for less next year. i dunno if i could ever do it myself.

thanks to all who offered advices. today is cold and windy but at least it's sunny so i want to spend some time with what's left of my flock... 4 doesn't seem like much of a flock anymore but we'll get more hens in the spring

 

[sulco]

Quote:
Wow.. and I thought our Barred Rock ratio was goofy. We got 12 BR and only 1 was supposed to be a rooster, but we ended up with 3 roosters. (I don't count my worthless Phoenix since he doesn't do much for the flock except harass the ladies and eat the food.)

 

[Picotine]

Quote:
Wow.. and I thought our Barred Rock ratio was goofy. We got 12 BR and only 1 was supposed to be a rooster, but we ended up with 3 roosters. (I don't count my worthless Phoenix since he doesn't do much for the flock except harass the ladies and eat the food.)

3 roosters wouldn't have been so bad, still less then 50%. it's hubby that went and picked them up and the guy picked 12 out of about 36. so it was pure lottery hehe
i'm hoping to have better ratio from the chicks our hens might hatch in the spring. being surrounded with so many roosters, i trust that nature has a way to balance itself and will produce more female chicks