We have 5 wyandotes that we got from chicks. Well, one of the chicks immediately got a spiky looking comb, which grew larger and larger as time went on, with accompanying big old wattles. This was unlike all our other wyandotte chicks, which had very small minimal ones.
We always knew that "The Captain" was different, which was sad because my neighbor had made it pretty clear that he would not be happy with a rooster next door. We figured we would give him away when the time came, and petted and hand held him as much as possible, and as a result he became super friendly.
He was always looking over his flock, somewhat seperate from them, more adventurous, more likely to try to get up to high places, bossier, independent. We waited for him to start crowing, hoping he wouldn't, or at least wouldn't do it all the time. After 6 months, he still hadn't leaned to crow at all, but had come out with a lot of sort of pretend crows, but not very good or loud ones. We counted ourselves lucky, thinking maybe we had a quiet roo.
Well, the other day I was in the coop building in some insulation, and he was VERY interested in the nesting box that I had put up last week. He kept hopping in and out, and turning around. Displaying a lot of nesting behavior, actually. He kept in there for a few minutes, I heard "RrrrRRRrrRrraaaaaarrwwk" *thump*..... and he hopped out.
Needless to say, in the nesting box that I had emptied out earlier, was a fresh egg! Our roo is a girl!
Now we have two laying hens out of the 5. I called up my kids to tell them because they were worried about having to give him away, they were very happy.
We always knew that "The Captain" was different, which was sad because my neighbor had made it pretty clear that he would not be happy with a rooster next door. We figured we would give him away when the time came, and petted and hand held him as much as possible, and as a result he became super friendly.
He was always looking over his flock, somewhat seperate from them, more adventurous, more likely to try to get up to high places, bossier, independent. We waited for him to start crowing, hoping he wouldn't, or at least wouldn't do it all the time. After 6 months, he still hadn't leaned to crow at all, but had come out with a lot of sort of pretend crows, but not very good or loud ones. We counted ourselves lucky, thinking maybe we had a quiet roo.
Well, the other day I was in the coop building in some insulation, and he was VERY interested in the nesting box that I had put up last week. He kept hopping in and out, and turning around. Displaying a lot of nesting behavior, actually. He kept in there for a few minutes, I heard "RrrrRRRrrRrraaaaaarrwwk" *thump*..... and he hopped out.
Needless to say, in the nesting box that I had emptied out earlier, was a fresh egg! Our roo is a girl!
Now we have two laying hens out of the 5. I called up my kids to tell them because they were worried about having to give him away, they were very happy.
