New to chickens and BYC!

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Amelia Egghart

Amelia Egghart

Songster
Jul 8, 2015
684
288
196
Fallbrook, CA
Hello BYCers! I'm new here and to the realm of chickening. I'm in sunny San Diego, CA in the town of Fallbrook on a half acre with a small flock of five... "pullets." Yes, those quotation marks come with a cost: 2/5 of my girls are looking (and sounding) like big, beautiful boys! :/

At 13 weeks old today, shiny, pointy saddle feathers are a sign of trouble to come, from what I've been reading about here! I'm hoping everyone gets along, but... Any methods out there that don't involve a stewpot or increasing my flock size to 20+?

Thanks! The adventures are just beginning!
 
Hello :frow and Welcome To BYC! You might want to check out the Learning Center, there are several articles in there on keeping a rooster https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/maintaining-a-healthy-flock With only 5 birds total, you'll probably have to keep the boys and girls separated or the boys will over mate the girls ... the boys may get along in a bachelor pen without any girls to fight over, but no way to know for sure.
 
Do you want to have fertile eggs or hatch or sell? If not, you don't need a rooster at all. Hens will continue to lay the same amount of eggs without one
 
drumstick diva said:
Do you want to have fertile eggs or hatch or sell?  If not,  you don't need a rooster at all.  Hens will continue to lay the same amount of eggs without one
Click to expand...


Unfortunately, these two came as sexed pullets; my intent was to only have hens to begin with. Now I'm faced with the dilemma of what to do with roosters! I don't eat eggs - my goal for these is manure/composting/bug control, at which roosters are just as useful as hens, but their infamous behavior concerns me.
 
Kelsie2290 said:
Hello :frow and Welcome To BYC! You might want to check out the Learning Center, there are several articles in there on keeping a rooster https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/maintaining-a-healthy-flock With only 5 birds total, you'll probably have to keep the boys and girls separated or the boys will over mate the girls ... the boys may get along in a bachelor pen without any girls to fight over, but no way to know for sure.
Click to expand...


Thanks for the info! The boys are best buds right now, so if they have their own digs with no "icky girls", that might go over well. :)
 
Hi, welcome to BYC!

Cute bird in your avatar, do you have other breeds as well?

I hope your boys will continue to get along. If you do decide to get rid of them (a lot of people do so it's not that easy), you can try a couple options here on BYC:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/270925/find-your-states-thread (post on your state thread about a new home)
https://www.backyardchickens.com/f/16182/animals-in-need-of-free-re-homing (free re-homing forum)

Good luck to you, hope all works out well for everyone!
 
The boys are still best buds at 8 months. They do everything together and the primary rooster treats the secondary rooster like he's a hen. Feeds him, tells him about the good grubs and herds him around. Too funny. The secondary rooster is sick or injured right now though, so I really hope he pulls through, for everyone's sake. He's inside, crated and warm. Poor baby :(
 

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