Managing my flock (roosters!) going forward!

[PouleChick]

Potentially found a home for a rooster (and hens if available) from someone in the village They lost thier flock and apparently had a lovely rooster so looking for another!

 

[PouleChick]

I'm so sorry for some reason I had missed my alert to replies on this thread and only saw I'd had replies when i did my update post last night! I wasnt' ignoring those that replied!

Dont count him out because he is little, my oldest rooster is from a bantam silkie frizzle over a large blue ameraucana. The lady I bought her from (she was at end of molt) told me he was grabbing feathers in the center of her back and ganging off,

That is pretty funny!

Any size bird is edible.
He may not be able to 'reach' to inseminate the larger girls, not that he won't try.
Mixing bantam and large fowl can work....or not...have read both successes and failures.

That is true - they love thier quails here - can't see the point myself (not keen on bones!) I'm hoping they'll be ok - I may end up having a bantam coop and a big chook coop but will see how we go, already the 2 silkies are back in sleeping together in the small coop (need to move Doris's young out - she has had it with them!) so potentially the other bantam can go in there too if need be and eventually I can make my current big coop into Banty land once I get my big coop done.

You can build your bachelor pen next to the others, but you need to make the walls solid a few feet high because they will fight through fence if they can see each other.

Oh what if there is roos on both sides or do you mean with the hens?

On the aggression, I usually see them come after me sometime after 12 months, but usually before 18 months.

Eeek that is ages to wait and hold off getting rid of roos and choosing the nicest - may have to rethink that plan!

You have to watch how you interact with the hens. If you need to pick a hen up, it's best to pick him up and put him in a cage where he can't see what you're up to. He'll get upset when he hears the hens squawk.

I hope I'm going to be OK having a roo!

I forgot to add too - King Louis the orp' splash mix roo has started crowing (kind of in a teenage boy voice cracking way - cracks me up every time I hear it ).