Housing for cockerel?

[Mixed flock enthusiast]

Hello All, my teen daughter and I began keeping chickens as a joint project last spring, and my daughter is somewhat unexpectedly (to me!) into breeding and keeping the cockerels/roosters. We have a 4 month E Frisian Gull cockerel (Lemonhead) that she wants to set up with electric fence/ portable coop and breed with gull females, of which we have one but plan to obtain more chicks in the spring. Lemonhead is currently in a 4x8’ tractor with a 4 mo silkie cockerel, because Lemonhead was grabbing the young pullets in the coop by the neck. We are looking for ideas as to how we can house Lemonhead until late next summer/early fall when we expect to have girls for him, as the current silkie companion should be moved in October. Some options: 1) leave alone in tractor (that sounds cruel to me, too little space and no companion) 2) leave in tractor with silkie (too little space, messes up the silkie plan) 3) place alone in mobile coop and electric fence, adjacent to another rooster with his hens (sounds like Lemonhead would go crazy trying to get to adjacent girls) 4) place in mobile coop/fence with two currently available girls when they are all six months old (sounds bad for the girls as ratio would be poor). Question: do any of these sound more workable? Any better ideas I’m missing? Thanks!

 

[Dona Worry]

If your daughter is into breeding, setting up a 'bachelor pad' coop+ enclosed run for twice as many birds as you think you will need it for is a good idea. You will invariably end up with more cockerels than you know what to do with, and a good place to keep them will serve you well.

 

[Mixed flock enthusiast]

If your daughter is into breeding, setting up a 'bachelor pad' coop+ enclosed run for twice as many birds as you think you will need it for is a good idea. You will invariably end up with more cockerels than you know what to do with, and a good place to keep them will serve you well.

Thanks, Donna, I do think that we should set up a bachelor pad, though my DD SWEARS that our current cockerels will be the end of it. In the near term though, I don’t have other cockerels to put with Lemonhead in a bachelor pad, as the 4 mo silkie cockerel is supposed to rejoin the coop with another, currently one month old black copper Marans cockerel in hopes that the silkie and now one mo old can coexist if the silkie is there first...

 

[aart]

though my DD SWEARS that our current cockerels will be the end of it.

Half the chicks she hatches out will be cockerels

There's a steep learning curve with keeping males,
at 4 months you're only seeing the very beginning of it.
A bachelor coop could work well for you, but you'll also need breeding pens to put the right males with the right females when the right time comes. They must be kept separate for up to 4 weeks if the 'wrong' males inseminate the 'wrong' females.

Your location could effect what kind of housing you'll need:
Where in this world are you located?
Climate is almost always a factor.
Please add your general geographical location to your profile.
It's easy to do, then it's always there!

 

[Mixed flock enthusiast]

Hi Aart, hopefully I’ve added location properly, it’s Stillwater, OK. I think that summer heat is the biggest weather concern for poultry in OK, though we do get some erratic frigid weather. I looked at breeding pens but we have a fair amount of prairie available and my husband doesn’t like permeant structures on the prairieland, so I came up with the electric netting and mobile coop idea instead. My posts are always too long so this was short on details, but we currently have a 6 month EE cockerel in a coop/ run with five hens he was hatched with, plus six four month pullets, two silkie pullets, seven four month old ducks (layer breed). The six month cockerel is doing ok with the pullets (only breeding the six month pullets who have been laying fertile eggs for two months now. No feather damage after initial learning curve, just getting spurs) though he has a little roid rage first thing in the morning. I wouldn’t have kept the EE roo, but DD is attached. So plan is to shift EE roo and his five gals (who have been unpleasant to newer pullets) to electric net/mobile coop, maybe have his hens hatch eggs to add pullets to get the favored 10 hens:roo. There is also a Newest batch of six, one month old chicks, that has a BCM roo and CCL pullets for breeding olive Eggers, and will be moved to coop with current 4 mo old pullets when EE and his gals move out. So, we have some idea of how obnoxious roosters can be, but I am keeping an eye on the Situation for DD and pullet safety. We plan to set the E Frisian Gull cockerel (Lemonhead) up with the electric netting/mobile coop and E Frisian Gull pulllets, but only have one gull pullet right now. Lemonhead is currently in a 4x8’ tractor with silkie cockerel, as EE roo acted like he was going to kill the two cockerels, plus Lemonhead was obnoxious to pullets. EF Gulls “don’t bear confinement well”, so I think that this setup can’t last too long. We’d like to “warehouse” the EF Gull cockerel for now, until we can get those EF Gull pullets in spring and put them together late summer. We do know that hatching eggs yields cockerels ;-). We’ve hatched multiple rounds of eggs this year and rehomed many cockerels (we’ve been lucky, I know, but I think that a lot of Oklahomans free range large groups of hens with numerous cockerels/roosters who end up as hawk bait, so I’ve been able to place all on Craigslist). If need be, I think we would consider eating extra Roos also. DD likes them but is at least somewhat selective! Anyway, I’m trying to support DD’s new hobby without taking over, which I’ve found incredibly difficult since I’m kind of an OCD animal lover and project planner myself!