How many roosters would you keep?

[tmayk]

We have a batch of young chickens running around the yard right now. We ordered 2 buff Orpington roosters to keep and the hatchery threw in an extra one (geee thanks) and so far 2 of the others have turned out to be Roos as well (1 buff and 1 Easter egger) there could be more, time will tell.
There are about 35 chicken total.
How many Roos would you keep?

Also we got a " mystery chick " from the hatchery and it's a rooster as well and turned out to be a bantam (they said it wouldn't be!!) and i would like to keep him. He would be the only banty in the bunch though. Do you think he'd be ok? Would he mate with the hens? He is a silver duckwing.

 

[Percheron chick]

And that's why you never order roosters on purpose when you are buying a large batch of chicks. Odds are you will always end up with more than enough cockerels.

If you go by the 1:10, than you would be looking at keeping 3. My math says you ended up with 7 plus the one banty. 25% of your chickens will be non layers that will for the most part just eat and cost you $$ to keep. I'd say just give them a little time. If they are at all aggressive towards people or the other chickens, soup. That's easy. You might naturally thin the herd down and you don't have to make any hard choices. They might all coexist peacefully together because they've been raised together. If you are planning on free ranging them, you might want an extra 1-2 just because that's an extra set of eyes and you will be more apt to lose one of them. Your pullets will most likely suffer if you keep all 8 and you will compromise their health and egg production. Me, I'd keep no more than 3 total.

 

[tmayk]

  And that's why you never order roosters on purpose when you are buying a large batch of chicks.  Odds are you will always end up with more than enough cockerels.

  If you go by the 1:10, than you would be looking at keeping 3.  My math says you ended up with 7 plus the one banty.  25% of your chickens will be non layers that will for the most part just eat and cost you $$ to keep.  I'd say just give them a little time.  If they are at all aggressive towards people or the other chickens, soup.  That's easy.  You might naturally thin the herd down and you don't have to make any hard choices.  They might all coexist peacefully together because they've been raised together.  If you are planning on free ranging them, you might want an extra 1-2 just because that's an extra set of eyes and you will be more apt to lose one of them. Your pullets will most likely suffer if you keep all 8 and you will compromise their health and egg production.  Me, I'd keep no more than 3 total.

I ordered them on purpose because I wanted a specific breed of rooster. I knew that Roos would pop up in my batch of sexed chicks, but couldn't guarantee I would get an Orpington rooster from the bunch. So far I have fewer Roos than I thought I would overall, but more of them are orpingtons than I expected.

 

[5 Acre Rooster]

Guess I am wondering if there is a certain reason you wanted the BO roosters. Are you plan on breeding them by breed? Or just letting them range and breed whatever hens they choose. Roosters are not mindful of breed specifics. To them a hen is a hen. Size color shape etc doesn't matter to them. If they are for flock protection and looks, that's different.

 

[TheChickendude1]

Stew up the extras when they get to crowing age

 

[donrae]

If all you wanted was the Orpington rooster, just keep him. Keep the bonus little guy if he's really stole your heart, but get rid of the others. As stated, no reason to keep a bird that's non-producing, that you didn't want in the first place.

 

[rc4u]

I always order sratight run as I want to butcher some...this year out of 36 I only got 7 roosters....jeff