JWChickens
Chirping
- Sep 20, 2020
- 24
- 55
- 66
I hope you all can help. I bought 10 hens to start my flock. Two buff orpingtons, two black sex links, two americauna, and four rhode island reds. We lost one buff orpington this spring to what we think was a raccoon. I have a completely enclosed run, but one of the buffs was dead with her neck pressed against the wire. She was cold, but still intact. Later this spring, a new chicken enthusiast's wife bought a straight run of chickens and got a few too many roosters, offering us one for free. I brought home a half grown rhode island red rooster. The problem, at least for me, is that he doesn't crow and is terrified of the hens. One or two of the hens is aggressive towards him and he runs into the coop to hide. We put him in his own small enclosure for a couple of weeks where everyone could see each other and interact, but while he is absolutely a treasure (acts really tame) when he is by himself, when placed among the hens, he gets pecked once or twice and runs in and hides in the coop. He has even been seen trying to get under a laying hen (which is a funny sight, let me tell you. It's hard to take this seriously when his head is jammed under a hen in the nest box). When we try to take care of the chickens, this timid rooster becomes Harry Houdini, running for the exit of the pen, as though his life depends on it.
Does anyone have any suggestions as to how to integrate him with the flock? Is it dangerous to leave him in there? Any help is appreciated. We don't want him to die from being too afraid to eat or drink, and he's actually bigger than the hens now (though he's still not fully mature, we think).
Does anyone have any suggestions as to how to integrate him with the flock? Is it dangerous to leave him in there? Any help is appreciated. We don't want him to die from being too afraid to eat or drink, and he's actually bigger than the hens now (though he's still not fully mature, we think).