How to protect myself from rooster

[2 many chickens]

I have a EE roo named Satan. He is an agresive 2 year old. He has came at me many times and attacked several of my family members. He has been smacked with sticks, kicked with a boot, carried around, isolated, etc. Nothing really has worked. He has calmed down some. I don't really get too close to him anymore and always have a watchful eye. I have many other roos that know to stay away from me because I did not baby them or interact with them hardly at all as chicks. With satan, he was babied and that's where I went wrong.

 

[centrarchid]

I'm not sure I want to sit in a chair in the run! I'm hoping he will mellow out as he ages. Shadrach had some useful points. I do agree that he needs to show "his" girls how great he is. The only thing he can do to show that is attack me. I'm not sure how I can feed him and not the girls as they all come rushing in to eat. He gives the food call while the girls eat first although he will still grab some food for himself. I wish I could pick up the girls but they are very skittish and run from me when I try. Since two of them are wearing dresses (I can't catch the third!), I have to pull them from the roost once a month to change them in to clean clothes. I've had chicks raised by hens and from incubator and these four want nothing to do with me which makes me sad. Even when they were tiny, they were funny in that they were always desperate for food but, when I'd hand feed live mealworms and such, they would zoom to get them and get away as fast as possible. They're never considered me their friend or mother. Years ago, I raised a single rooster from hatching (all the others failed to hatch), and Beebee was so sweet. He was always lonely and crying and liked to be held as a baby, and as a rooster, he was rarely aggressive but he did have another rooster a month older with him so maybe that is why. That rooster, Sugar, was another nasty Easter egg chicken that we bought as a day-old "female" chick. Beebee was eaten by a fox who dug in at two years old (I was devastated), and Sugar had a son named Speckles who was also sweet. Sugar and Speckles became arch enemies. I have lots of chicken stories.

I will cut to the chase on this as the "fluff" talk is not going to help. He is not showing off for his girls and it is very unlikely he will simply mature out of the aggressive behavior. The business of feeding him alone and the method you are likely to impose will aggravate the situation.

I raise roosters by likely most methods out there. Methods include hen-hatching and rearing, incubator through brooder rearing, and hand-rearing plus hybrids between those methods. Most, but not all are kept in social groups with elder roosters. Methods do not appear to promote a strong pattern in how a rooster behaves as an adult. Each year I keep about half a dozen roosters in setups very similar to yours so have a handle on the challenges. The aggression most people see appears to be a function of conditioning applied by the poultry keeper. A good example of bad for that is inferred by @Al Capon, do not do stuff like that as you have been with the shovel.

My roosters are expected to be gentle and easy to handle by even kids lack experience around chickens. I have a good number of roosters and have done so over many years. The problem you have is a function of your behavior, and more likely than not it can be corrected for both parties. You have to get over your fears or re-home him. There is responsibilities to keep chickens that have yet to be demonstrated.

 

[bobbi-j]

They're never considered me their friend or mother. Years ago, I raised a single rooster from hatching (all the others failed to hatch), and Beebee was so sweet. He was always lonely and crying and liked to be held as a baby, and as a rooster, he was rarely aggressive but he did have another rooster a month older with him so maybe that is why. That rooster, Sugar, was another nasty Easter egg chicken that we bought as a day-old "female" chick. Beebee was eaten by a fox who dug in at two years old (I was devastated), and Sugar had a son named Speckles who was also sweet. Sugar and Speckles became arch enemies. I have lots of chicken stories.

Nor are they going to. They are chickens, you are a human. They may learn to tolerate your presence if you are able to spend time with them (sitting in the run, tossing out treats now and then, not moving and letting them get used to you may be one way of doing that). Chickens don't relate to each other or humans as humans do. They have an entirely different social set up and set of behaviors. They are not going to be grateful to you for feeding them or keeping them alive. They have come to depend on you. That's why they come running when you bring food.

 

[Peppercorngal]

I'm not sure I want to sit in a chair in the run! I'm hoping he will mellow out as he ages. Shadrach had some useful points. I do agree that he needs to show "his" girls how great he is. The only thing he can do to show that is attack me. I'm not sure how I can feed him and not the girls as they all come rushing in to eat. He gives the food call while the girls eat first although he will still grab some food for himself. I wish I could pick up the girls but they are very skittish and run from me when I try. Since two of them are wearing dresses (I can't catch the third!), I have to pull them from the roost once a month to change them in to clean clothes. I've had chicks raised by hens and from incubator and these four want nothing to do with me which makes me sad. Even when they were tiny, they were funny in that they were always desperate for food but, when I'd hand feed live mealworms and such, they would zoom to get them and get away as fast as possible. They're never considered me their friend or mother. Years ago, I raised a single rooster from hatching (all the others failed to hatch), and Beebee was so sweet. He was always lonely and crying and liked to be held as a baby, and as a rooster, he was rarely aggressive but he did have another rooster a month older with him so maybe that is why. That rooster, Sugar, was another nasty Easter egg chicken that we bought as a day-old "female" chick. Beebee was eaten by a fox who dug in at two years old (I was devastated), and Sugar had a son named Speckles who was also sweet. Sugar and Speckles became arch enemies. I have lots of chicken stories.

I love to sit in the run with the chickens! I also spend time sitting on a stool in the coop watching the chickens lay their eggs! I'd say I spend probably 4 hours a week with them at minimum. They seem to me as little friends with different personalities and I like to watch them. Some of them will let me pick them up, but as a general rule I do not. They were raised together and I didn't pick them up and "pet" them as chicks. They are all very nice, even Harvey the rooster, who at 15 months old still likes to eat treats from my hand. I had other roosters but sold my black giant, my Delaware (who was mean) and my Brahma (who was a mistake, he was to be a hen) because I only wanted one nice rooster.

 

[Shadrach]

I have yet to find a single solution to chicken behavior in general. I am convinced though that the keeping arrangements and the humans attitude and behavior towards roosters in particular ends up being the defining factor.
There are things ime that make for better stability in the relationships between one species and another and within the species group.
It is too late now, but your combination of rooster breed and hen breed has caused you problems. Your hens would probably not be wearing 'dresses' if the rooster was of their breed.
I get a lot of dismissals when I write, don't mix breeds. It can be done. many do it and the chickens adapt. However, an easy structure is keep a single breed.
There is of course the obvious problem of keeping creatures in cages. This alters their behavior. It's a problem zoos and farms have acknowledged and researched.
Centrarchid's advice to spend time with your chickens is actually one way to reduce the tension. If you are suitably clothed, I usually wear heavy overalls over trousers and site boots for example. If the clothing is loose it is very difficult for a chicken to do me any damage and this means I can concentrate on what I need to do without worrying about getting hurt in the process. With roosters it's particularly important. Even the most aggressive roosters I've had here soon realize that flat out attacks don't seem to effect me. They just don't bother after a while and I can start to adjust their view of me by adjusting my treatment of them. Eventually I find something that works for both of us.
I have a mix of animals here and problems between the various species are virtually non existent until it comes to humans.