Alright so I have taken advice from several people, I read the sexing experience thread on here, and know i must ask ya once more....HELP! I NEED anwswers! My issue is I recieved 2 chicks for Easter and I love them soo much they weren't really for me but i have taken care of them and they are basically mine, i didn't get too attached at first cause i was scared i would kill them but i didn't...so far. they are 4-5weeks old and i am so proud of them i love them so much! now that i have bragged on my chicks heres the problem: the people who gave them to us thought they were doing us a favor by giving us 1 boy 1 girl, how wrong they are! well i thought they diidn't know but i held them upside down and one draws its legs in and the other kicks around, the one that kicks its legs acts SO much like a rooster and vice a versa. well i did want baby chicks but i don't want to make my rooster evil and make him abuse her or hurt anyone who touches him. so i said fine i don't want more chicks. now keep in mind i am on a budget i know yall say go get more but i can't!only if they will die must i cause i just bought $100 hutch and don;t have money for more. anyways so i was wondering should i seperate them so he won't be mean? and if so when? they are so attached to each other! I have been losing sleep over this i'm so worried i don't really want to get rid of the rooster or the hen, i love them so much they have even slept with me!I AM SO FRANTIC!
Chickens are flock animals. They are social. Why would you want to separate them and have them live alone? If you separate them and have them live alone you will have very lonely chicks and eventually mature chickens that don't know how to live with other chickens - talk about creating mean chickens. Calm down. Raise the chicks together. Hand feed them. Keep in mind that NOTHING you do can promise that you will have a docile or gentle rooster. Even the nicest, sweetest roos can turn aggressive as they mature. Roosters are no different than a bull or a stallion. Roosters are the same only packaged in a much smaller body. Now, take a deep breath and relax. It will all work out fine if you don't over complicate things yourself. Welcome to BYC!
lol ok so i'm a little clamer but the reason why i thought maybe seperating them and getting another hen and a another rooster so they both have companions but i don't want him sexually abusing my hen, i was told he would be nasty around hens and beat up on her, so i don;t have to tske any action? they already eat out o fmy hand all the time.
For a long time I had one rooster and one hen. They were inseparable (still are after 8 years together). He never "abused" her. She never had her feathers torn out by him or anything like that. Keep them both. If someday he becomes a problem, then worry about it.
I agree with the above posts.... take a deep breath and calm down. It's so great to hear from someone else that just loves their chickens (like the other 8999 people here). Don't worry about something that hasn't happened yet. Keep the two together and IF the Roo becomes a problem to your hen in the future then deal with it. If you can add one more hen right now it would probably be a great idea --- just in case -- your Roo has to leave someday, your hen won't be an only girl. Chickens really are social and have to have the company of at least one other chicken to be happiest and healthiest.
I have always had a rooster in with hens since I've been doing this. It's fine! Believe me the roo don't bother the hens, if at all. Now two roos together may get funky with each ther. But then again, my friend down the road has both roos and hens and they don't really mess with each other. Someone once told me that RIR tend to be a little bit more canibalistic and meaner than the others. I don't know if that is true, but I'm sure someone on here might know . I had an experience one time with the roos of a friend. I was Rooster/Hen Sitting for her. Those roo's were always trying to attack me. Worse thing to do is let them know your scared of them. So I have to agree with the others, just because he's a roo don't mean he will turn nasty.
I have 54 chickens. 3 are Roos. All live together very happily. The boys each have their own little harems. I have had no fights so far, other than maybe one chasing the other once in a while. None of my roos are mean or aggressive towards people or the hens. They all roost together at night in the same pen on the same roost. So calm down and enjoy them!! They may turn out to be best friends!!!
good!thank yall so much! chirpy what do u mean the roo has to leave ,my chicken tikka massala has to leave?
Quote:I think possibly dies, or maybe some day you do deside to get rid of him. Just my take on what was said about "if the roo has to leave". We have 30+ish chickens and 3 roosters. All get along great ( we had a 4th rooster but he passed some time ago). All have there favor girls that follow them around. It's kind of funny because our smallest rooster-who is NOT a banty "Nubs" has the banty's following him everywhere. Cotton Candy who IS our banty rooster has the younger girls following him. And Sam our largest rooster has all the older (over 1 year old) girls following him. None fight. Not even seem to care about the other rooster. It just seemed to work together so wonderfully.
I just meant that if something were to happen in the future and you had to rehome your Rooster or he died or whatever... that would leave your hen all by herself. Or, for that matter, if your hen died in the future and you just had your Roo all by himself. I'm just trying to think ahead here. It's often harder to acclimate two adult chickens together so if you ended up with just one chicken in the future it might be hard to find another adult chicken that would be friends with it. Getting another chick now, while they are young, and letting them grow up together would help them be friends when they are older. If you can't get another chick now then don't worry ... enjoy these two. Does that make sense??