My rooster is killing his "favorite" hen. Is this common?

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susanatull

Chirping
5 Years
Mar 30, 2018
2
15
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Hi, my name is Susana, I hav a small flock 5 hens and a rooster. This is my third time raising chickens and it has been quite a learning experience to me. I live in the country so there is quite a few predators that like chickens and chicken eggs starting from snakes to hawks, bob cats and many others . I am a full time teacher with not a lot of extra time for my favorite hobbies gardening, landscaping .
Last Spring(2017) one of my hens decided to be a mom. At that time I didn't have a rooster so I got her some fertile eggs and she hatched 7 beautiful chicks, they were one week old when all of them but one became a rat snake dinner. The survivor chick became a beautiful red Island rooster that knows he is beautiful. No too long ago I thought one of our hens got hurt by an animal, her head was bleeding and she was hiding behind the coop. She died that day. Later the same thing happened to another hen, this time I saw the rooster going after her without mercy, attacking her furiously, I scare him pretty bad, but he end up hurting her pretty badly, she was gone in a few days. Today he was after another one she seems pretty scared of him, for a while she has been his favorite one. I don't know if this is normal behavior, or some rooster become bullies. Can some one tell me if this behavior is common among flocks?
Thanks,
 
Is he aggressively mating?
This isn’t common,although RIRs are pretty prone to be aggressive,and yes sometimes stuff like this happens,escpecially in spring.I notice my rooster seems to aggressively grab hens out of know where,but it’s usally just an urge to mate,sometimes I think he gets a slight urge and just wants to grab the head but decided,hm never mind,and it’s not a common behavior year round,it’s just a spring time thing for him.Maybe yours is doing the same thing but a thousand times worse,roosters do favor hens but it’s usually to breed,not kill.If he is seriously killing them,he needs to be separated.Is he flicking and spurring the hens,almost like he would in a fight?Do you free range?What do you feed?
 
Susanna, that is totally unacceptable behavior. You need to immediately separate that roo from the hens. You need to keep him separated until you either kill him and eat him, have some one else kill him, or kill him and bury him, preferably planting a lovely rose bush over the spot. Occasionally, a roo or other flock members will drive a sick bird out of the flock. But for him to kill her, that goes into the realm of truly deranged. Tell me a bit about your set up. How many birds, total. What are the dimensions of your coop and your run? It may be possible that if your birds are shut in a coop/run situation, the hen can't escape the roo. No matter what the coop and run size. That roo needs to be killed. He is a killer, and should not be allowed near ANY flock.
 
susanatull said:
Hi, my name is Susana, I hav a small flock 5 hens and a rooster. This is my third time raising chickens and it has been quite a learning experience to me. I live in the country so there is quite a few predators that like chickens and chicken eggs starting from snakes to hawks, bob cats and many others . I am a full time teacher with not a lot of extra time for my favorite hobbies gardening, landscaping .
Last Spring(2017) one of my hens decided to be a mom. At that time I didn't have a rooster so I got her some fertile eggs and she hatched 7 beautiful chicks, they were one week old when all of them but one became a rat snake dinner. The survivor chick became a beautiful red Island rooster that knows he is beautiful. No too long ago I thought one of our hens got hurt by an animal, her head was bleeding and she was hiding behind the coop. She died that day. Later the same thing happened to another hen, this time I saw the rooster going after her without mercy, attacking her furiously, I scare him pretty bad, but he end up hurting her pretty badly, she was gone in a few days. Today he was after another one she seems pretty scared of him, for a while she has been his favorite one. I don't know if this is normal behavior, or some rooster become bullies. Can some one tell me if this behavior is common among flocks?
Thanks,
Click to expand...
That behavior is not allowed and it's not going to get better either. You need to cull him... I know that can be hard, but you can't sell him to anyone with a temper like that. If you let him breed it would make his children aggressive too because that's genetic in chickens.
 
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Welcome to Backyard chickens!

Sorry for the aggressive rooster

Here in Woodland California there is a rooster rescue not far from us. Check to see it there is one in your area.
 

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