Over mating and rooster to hen ratio

[Polloloco86]

I have 19 hens and 2 roosters. 6 of my hens are losing feathers on their backs. The others are fine. My theory is that the top rooster has 13 of the hens and the other has 6. If I add more hens, will the harems even out? Or is there a high chance that the top rooster will just take the new ones? And any advice on a different course of action and how to heal the hens would be great. They all range during the day (I have acreage). The roosters are 10 mos and the hens range from 6 months to 10 months

 

[aart]

And any advice on a different course of action

Get rid of at least one of the males.

Lost feathers from treading can be because of too much treading and/or bad technique. It can also be because of brittle feathers.

 

[Polloloco86]

If I want fertile eggs, is a 19 to 1 ratio good?

 

[aart]

If I want fertile eggs, is a 19 to 1 ratio good?

It worked for me here.

 

[Mrs. K]

Your hens are obviously getting bred, so I would not worry about it too much. But when you cook, keep a check on the fertility of the eggs. If you are getting all or nearly all bulls eyes when you cook, you can set with confidence.

If you are not, (or even if you are, but are serious about breeding) you should be picky about which hen's eggs you hatch, not like me that just grabs what eggs I have and hope for the best.

But a small pen, 3-5 of the best hens with the rooster for a week, and you should have plenty of eggs to hatch.

I agree with AArt - let a rooster go. It will help. Ridgerunner, a highly respected poster - says he culls bare back chickens, thinks their feathers are more brittle, and the problem went away. So it might not all be the rooster's fault.

Depending where you are - molting can make this look worse too.

But pay attention to your hens, I have found that bare backs bother people way more than they bother hens. If your hens are avoiding the rooster - he is the problem, if they hang on his every cluck, well it doesn't bother them.

Mrs K

 

[Shadrach]

Very difficult to avoid mainly because a rooster will mate his favourites more than the junior hens usually. Roosters will obviously favour those hens that are in lay.
I don't cull hens with weak feathering but bare backs do seem to bother the keeper more than the hens in most cases. Keep an eye on their backs in case the skin gets broken.
Usually it's not the spurs that do the feather damage; it's the feet/toenails and bad technique. One can file the roosters toenails smooth and this I found helped.
If one keeps all the chickens in one coop and they are laregely confined to a coop and run then just having one rooster is probably the easiest way forward. An alternative which I would try given the space and funds is to split the group and provide a second coop for the junior rooster and his six hens.

 

[Polloloco86]

Very difficult to avoid mainly because a rooster will mate his favourites more than the junior hens usually. Roosters will obviously favour those hens that are in lay.
I don't cull hens with weak feathering but bare backs do seem to bother the keeper more than the hens in most cases. Keep an eye on their backs in case the skin gets broken.
Usually it's not the spurs that do the feather damage; it's the feet/toenails and bad technique. One can file the roosters toenails smooth and this I found helped.
If one keeps all the chickens in one coop and they are laregely confined to a coop and run then just having one rooster is probably the easiest way forward. An alternative which I would try given the space and funds is to split the group and provide a second coop for the junior rooster and his six hens.

They have a 200 sq ft coop and are only confined to it at night. Others they completely free range

 

[Ridgerunner]

If I add more hens, will the harems even out?

A question for those that have a large number of hens and plenty of space. That includes you Polloloco86. How do you see your flocks behave? I generally see a small number of hens hang close to a rooster while the others form cliques and sort of wonder off to wherever they want to go. They don't get lost over the horizon but they don't stay close enough that he is really looking out for predators for them. I often use the term harem too but to me it is not a tight group totally under the rooster's immediate control.

Just curious. How are your 6-month-olds mixing in to the two harems?

I haven't interviewed the girls but it is my understanding from what I've seen and read that the girls decide which rooster they hang with. If they hang at all.

You can have barebacked hens whether you have a ratio of 1 rooster to 2 hens or 1 to 20. Or you can have none. Some factors are the male's technique, how much the girl resists and fights, how often they mate, difference in the weight of the rooster compared to the girl, and if the girls have brittle feathers.

I once had a cockerel and 8 pullets about the age of your oldest ones. Two of the pullets developed bare backs, bare enough to concern me. Since one of my goals in having chickens is to raise them to eat, I ate those two. None of the remaining 6 pullets developed bare backs so I did not see how I could blame the cockerel. None of the pullets I later hatched from those developed bare backs so I assume those genetics were not passed down.

And any advice on a different course of action and how to heal the hens would be great.

Are they actually injured to the point where they need to heal? Any cuts or scratches? Or are you just talking about the feathers growing back? If the entire feather is gone the replacement feather should start growing back fairly soon. But if even a speck of the shaft is left behind that feather will not grow back until they molt. With your pullets that could easily be next fall.

Some feather loss isn't all that unusual or bad. The risk is that they get a bare spot that can be cut by the rooster's claws. Once your cockerel's spurs grow long enough and sharp enough they might be a risk also. It usually looks a lot worse than it is but I can't say there is never any risk. There certainly can be.

So what are your options?

If none are getting hurt, let things continue as they are.

It sounds like you want fertile eggs so getting rid of both boys would not work. You can try getting rid of one of them. It might reduce the barebacked problem. It might not. Dad had a free ranging flock of one rooster and usually 25 to 30 hens. Practically all of those eggs were fertile but how successful you are with that can really vary. Some roosters may only keep a small handful of girls fertile. The bigger the rooster is and the older he is the more trouble they seem to have keeping a lot fertile, but Dad's was a full-sized dual purpose mixed breed rooster.

You can put "aprons" on the girls with the bare backs. You can do a search and find a pattern or a supplier for the aprons.

You can blunt the tips of the boys' claws. Wrap them in a blanket of big towel to help control them and using pet clippers or a Dremel with a grinding disc take off the sharp tips. Once the spurs grow in you can blunt them also. The claws and the spurs have a blood-filled quick so if you cut too deeply they can bleed so have some cornstarch or flour handy to throw on to stop the bleeding. Pretty soon you'll figure out how deeply you can cut without bleeding.

You could get rid of the girls with the bare backs. See if that solves your problems. I personally would not want to be breeding them anyway so I'm not breeding a bareback problem into my flock.

Good luck!

 

[Yardmom]

You have cockerels and pullets not mature roosters and hens. The dynamics of your flock is going to continue to change. Watch how the girls are responding to the boys. As others mentioned humans are bothered more by bare backs than hens. Also the bare backs may not be being caused by one cockerel. It may be the pullets that are most attractive to both cockerels are getting bare backs.

 

[Polloloco86]

A question for those that have a large number of hens and plenty of space. That includes you Polloloco86. How do you see your flocks behave? I generally see a small number of hens hang close to a rooster while the others form cliques and sort of wonder off to wherever they want to go. They don't get lost over the horizon but they don't stay close enough that he is really looking out for predators for them. I often use the term harem too but to me it is not a tight group totally under the rooster's immediate control.

Just curious. How are your 6-month-olds mixing in to the two harems?

I haven't interviewed the girls but it is my understanding from what I've seen and read that the girls decide which rooster they hang with. If they hang at all.

You can have barebacked hens whether you have a ratio of 1 rooster to 2 hens or 1 to 20. Or you can have none. Some factors are the male's technique, how much the girl resists and fights, how often they mate, difference in the weight of the rooster compared to the girl, and if the girls have brittle feathers.

I once had a cockerel and 8 pullets about the age of your oldest ones. Two of the pullets developed bare backs, bare enough to concern me. Since one of my goals in having chickens is to raise them to eat, I ate those two. None of the remaining 6 pullets developed bare backs so I did not see how I could blame the cockerel. None of the pullets I later hatched from those developed bare backs so I assume those genetics were not passed down.


Are they actually injured to the point where they need to heal? Any cuts or scratches? Or are you just talking about the feathers growing back? If the entire feather is gone the replacement feather should start growing back fairly soon. But if even a speck of the shaft is left behind that feather will not grow back until they molt. With your pullets that could easily be next fall.

Some feather loss isn't all that unusual or bad. The risk is that they get a bare spot that can be cut by the rooster's claws. Once your cockerel's spurs grow long enough and sharp enough they might be a risk also. It usually looks a lot worse than it is but I can't say there is never any risk. There certainly can be.

So what are your options?

If none are getting hurt, let things continue as they are.

It sounds like you want fertile eggs so getting rid of both boys would not work. You can try getting rid of one of them. It might reduce the barebacked problem. It might not. Dad had a free ranging flock of one rooster and usually 25 to 30 hens. Practically all of those eggs were fertile but how successful you are with that can really vary. Some roosters may only keep a small handful of girls fertile. The bigger the rooster is and the older he is the more trouble they seem to have keeping a lot fertile, but Dad's was a full-sized dual purpose mixed breed rooster.

You can put "aprons" on the girls with the bare backs. You can do a search and find a pattern or a supplier for the aprons.

You can blunt the tips of the boys' claws. Wrap them in a blanket of big towel to help control them and using pet clippers or a Dremel with a grinding disc take off the sharp tips. Once the spurs grow in you can blunt them also. The claws and the spurs have a blood-filled quick so if you cut too deeply they can bleed so have some cornstarch or flour handy to throw on to stop the bleeding. Pretty soon you'll figure out how deeply you can cut without bleeding.

You could get rid of the girls with the bare backs. See if that solves your problems. I personally would not want to be breeding them anyway so I'm not breeding a bareback problem into my flock.

Good luck!

So I spent the day watching chickens. The 6 month olds were raised with guinea fowl. They range with the guinea fowl, but come when the roosters call. I will see all the birds forage together, and I will also see smaller groups with each rooster. In the coop at night, the 6 month olds and the 10 month olds are mixed together. There’s one group rooster that guards the door and has a couple hens with him. The second rooster is in the back of the coop with a group of hens, and then there’s a group that sleeps apart from the roosters. All eggs I have cracked are fertile, including the ones from the 6 month olds.
The hens that are losing feathers don’t appear to be getting worse; I haven’t seen any cuts, scratching, or bleeding. They don’t seem to dislike the roosters. I will consider culling the bare back ones if it gets worse. I don’t want chickens I have to dress, so will forego the aprons. I will watch for now