Mysterious Death of our Beloved Rooster

[MisterRoost]

Hello
Me and my girlfriend are new to the chicken world and this morning found our fit and healthy 5 month old rooster dead at the bottom of the coop. We keep 2 dwarf brown laced wyndottes and 3 silver laced wyndotte hens and a silver laced rooster. The 2 dwarfs are 7 months and the rest 5 months old. The dwarfs have been ruling the coop since we introduced them 3 months ago but have got along fine. only recently the rooster has been trying to become the top chicken and challenging the dominant hen. He was doing all the right things, protecting and looking out for the rest and then this happened. It was no way a predator. He never had any visible signs of bite marks or scratches on his body. He was a strong boy and was his normal self when i closed the coop for the night. Yesterday they had a squabble and it seemed that the old girl came out on top. Was our rooster attacked in the coop

The water bowl had been knocked over and not sure if that was anything to do with a struggle or what....

We are very sad to of lost our young man and any help or previous experiences shared would be much appreciated
Thanks

 

[chicmom]

So sorry to hear that! Sometimes, you really never find out what has happened. I will say that chickens can have heart attacks or illnesses that suddenly come upon them just like people do.

I've kept chickens for years now, and one day, I couldn't find Petite Miss. She was one of my oldest hens. I looked everywhere. I called to her. (She usually came running--she liked to be held.) Anyhow, I found her dead. Not a single mark on her. No sign of trauma. I never did find out what went wrong.

Again, hugs and I'm so sorry.

 

[MisterRoost]

Thanks. We got pretty attached to the little fella