how much aggression from a rooster is just normal?

ctcasper

Songster
11 Years
Apr 4, 2008
119
0
129
Minnesota
I have two roos who seem to get along very well with eachother, but the older more dominant roo, a barred rock, can get a little rough with us. They are in a pretty small coop while there new one is being built and he wants out so he will attack your leg when you go in to collect eggs or water and feed them. He also attacked my 18 month old one day when they were out while the kids were playing. He won't come looking for you to attack, but if you get too close, and the kids don't know better they just want to see them. Anyway, how much of that is just normal and will happen with any roo? And can you train them anyway to not do that?
 
Mine don't free range all the time, so I just don't let the kids and chickens both out together unless I am right there with the kids to make sure they don't chase them. I just figured that I wouldn't find a rooster that would never attack, so if I wanted a roo (to have babies) I had to deal with it somehow.
 
It is possible to retrain your rooster to give you plenty of room and respect when you're around them.
Children are another story altogther. When I look at our 2 y.o. GS "thru the roosters eyes", I see a noisy little thing that's running around trying to catch the hens. It's quite possible that the rooster sees a little child as a predator and it's his job to protect his hens from predators. I think it would be difficult, if not impossible, to convince a rooster otherwise.
Even though my roosters are very well behaved around adults, I make sure all the chickens stay out of the fenced yard when the GS visits. Now that they are grown, there's only one gate they can still squeeze thru, so I block that gate off when he's here.
I'd hate for the GS to be injured. I'd also hate to have my rooster killed when to his mind he was only doing his job.
Just my 2 cents.
 
thanks gritsar, your post was very nice and reasonable, I will just make sure I monitor the kids and make sure they are not near the rooster or hens when they are outside.
 

New posts New threads Active threads

Back
Top Bottom