Pennsylvania!! Unite!!

[fisherlady]

Ours tend to charge us, try to get into staring contests with us etc. At this point, hubby wouldn't mind killing them but we feel the flock protection is important.
That's good to know. I mostly want to be able to touch them if need be (like if they are hurt) and I need them to let me pick up a hen or walk across the yard!

In our flock a rooster is expected to be respectful and tolerant of handling, even if he isn't thrilled by it. Any which try to challenge us or show any questionable intent go straight to freezer camp. There are a lot of friendly birds out there to be found and I have no desire to breed on aggressive ones. Hens are the same...you can get some who are rather nasty and they don't get to continue their ways.
Just be careful to give a rooster a fair evaluation...him getting irrate when there is a lot of stimulation going on (such as multiple kids and or dogs running around) may be more about his instinctual concern over protecting his hens from what he thinks is an onslaught of threats rather than him being an aggressive bird. However a bird who will stalk, charge or attack you from behind or without any provoking factors is a problem in my book. I don't have the concern of small kids running around but I use that possibility as a guideline for how well I trust my roosters.
And no, I see no problems with friendly roosters being less protective of their girls.

 

[fisherlady]

wertorpsu:

I don't think roos being friendly with humans has anything to do with the way they handle other birds or predators....flapping as you walk by is a normal thing....some think its aggression, I think they just letting you know they are alert....my two cents....

X2

 

[Werforpsu]

I said earlier that I believe a chicken's "friendliness" is mostly a factor of how they are raised. I also think a rooster's "fiestiness" is partially that but has at least some genetic component. My largest roos (New Hampshires, Bielefelders, Rhodebars) have always been the most docile.It's as if they know they have nothing to prove. I remember treating Rhodebars for lice a while back. It involved catching each one, putting a few drops of Ivermectin on the skin behind their head, them stuffing them into a dog carrier to separate the ones I had already treated. One by one, I grabbed all the hens that were being protected by my 2 roos and they were obviously in distress about it, but never did anything to stop me. Once it was all done and the hens released, they quickly went back to normal. OTOH, simply getting eggs out of the pen with my original Rees Legbar roo often resulted in some serious drama. Eventually I had enough and he was replaced and put out to free range. He carried a grudge about that and would stalk me around the pens, sometimes nipping the back of my pants and look up defiantly. One day he got sold to a person with carnivorous intentions. The moral being "don't bite the hand that feeds you" (or otherwise controls your fate).

I would never expect at Bielefelder or Welbar to attack me, I ignore them and freely turn my back to them, even though they could do serious damage compared to the little Legbars. But I'm always keeping an eye on the Legbar roos, even the young ones that have never shown aggression, I just expect some to go bad someday. I raised a lot of Legbar cockerels, so my policy will be "1 strike and you're out of the breeding pen". I only kept 1 Biel cockerel because I know he'll be nice to deal with.

Your Rees Legbar sounds a bit like ours. They have ran at the kids making them drop eggs when trying to get them from the coop. They routinely charge all of us when we walk by. I should note that we have too many cockerels for our flock size. I'm not sure the impact that has on their aggression either. We started with our first 11 chicks this past spring. 5 ended up being cockerels. We butchered one at about 20 weeks who was VERY aggressive and drew blood from my 9 year old by chasing him and pecking him. At that point we gave 1 away to a friend whose rooster was killed by a predator. After that, the other three kind of settled in. #'s 2 and 3 would raise their hackles with each other, but they have no real spurs yet so no one has been injured. We have a very clear pecking order with them.
Our desire was to ultimately keep the #1 cockerel. He seemed more concerned about the pullets then the other two and was clearly the leader of the flock. The one we gave away was also killed by a predator. Our friends are making some changes to there set up...her chickens were originally free range all day and she keeps cutting back free time but still loosing them. We plan to give them one of our now 30 week old cockerels (assuming we can trap it/catch it in some way). We then plan to butcher the third and be left with 1.
A few weeks ago we lost a pullet and the whole flock dynamic changed. The cockerels stopped worrying about each other as much and started a zone defense whenever they were out free ranging. They herd the pullets close in like they never used to.
All of that is a long way of saying, we have 8 chickens: 5 pullets and 3 cockerels and I keep questioning if the flock make up is a big part of the aggression.

I do think I will try to handle our next group more and am interested in a different cockerel, maybe one that is a specifically docile breed. The #1 cockerel we have is from an Amish farm so breed is not really known but he appears to be a RIR of sorts. #2 is a black sex link that was accidentally part of our TSC chicks and #3 is also a red bird from an Amish farm, though clearly not exactly the same as the other red one...somewhat different shape and different leg color.

 

[AnneInTheBurbs]

Ours tend to charge us, try to get into staring contests with us etc. At this point, hubby wouldn't mind killing them but we feel the flock protection is important.
That's good to know. I mostly want to be able to touch them if need be (like if they are hurt) and I need them to let me pick up a hen or walk across the yard!

Those guys are gorgeous! Love those pics!

On the rooster thing, most of our roos aren't huggable (one or two are) but none of them are mean. We try to socialize them as they're growing up and keep them friendly. If they get mean, they get a one way trip to the freezer. Most of our roos are still very good flock protectors (with the exception of, say, our silkie) and never fail to sound the alarm when there's danger.

I said earlier that I believe a chicken's "friendliness" is mostly a factor of how they are raised. I also think a rooster's "fiestiness" is partially that but has at least some genetic component. My largest roos (New Hampshires, Bielefelders, Rhodebars) have always been the most docile.It's as if they know they have nothing to prove. I remember treating Rhodebars for lice a while back. It involved catching each one, putting a few drops of Ivermectin on the skin behind their head, them stuffing them into a dog carrier to separate the ones I had already treated. One by one, I grabbed all the hens that were being protected by my 2 roos and they were obviously in distress about it, but never did anything to stop me. Once it was all done and the hens released, they quickly went back to normal. OTOH, simply getting eggs out of the pen with my original Rees Legbar roo often resulted in some serious drama. Eventually I had enough and he was replaced and put out to free range. He carried a grudge about that and would stalk me around the pens, sometimes nipping the back of my pants and look up defiantly. One day he got sold to a person with carnivorous intentions. The moral being "don't bite the hand that feeds you" (or otherwise controls your fate).

I would never expect at Bielefelder or Welbar to attack me, I ignore them and freely turn my back to them, even though they could do serious damage compared to the little Legbars. But I'm always keeping an eye on the Legbar roos, even the young ones that have never shown aggression, I just expect some to go bad someday. I raised a lot of Legbar cockerels, so my policy will be "1 strike and you're out of the breeding pen". I only kept 1 Biel cockerel because I know he'll be nice to deal with.

I love my bielfelder hen and I'd love another couple and maybe a Roo next year. My goodness. My coop is filling up fast. Do you think that my husband won't notice new ones at this point?

Ours tend to charge us, try to get into staring contests with us etc. At this point, hubby wouldn't mind killing them but we feel the flock protection is important.
That's good to know. I mostly want to be able to touch them if need be (like if they are hurt) and I need them to let me pick up a hen or walk across the yard!

In our flock a rooster is expected to be respectful and tolerant of handling, even if he isn't thrilled by it. Any which try to challenge us or show any questionable intent go straight to freezer camp. There are a lot of friendly birds out there to be found and I have no desire to breed on aggressive ones. Hens are the same...you can get some who are rather nasty and they don't get to continue their ways.
Just be careful to give a rooster a fair evaluation...him getting irrate when there is a lot of stimulation going on (such as multiple kids and or dogs running around) may be more about his instinctual concern over protecting his hens from what he thinks is an onslaught of threats rather than him being an aggressive bird. However a bird who will stalk, charge or attack you from behind or without any provoking factors is a problem in my book. I don't have the concern of small kids running around but I use that possibility as a guideline for how well I trust my roosters.
And no, I see no problems with friendly roosters being less protective of their girls.

I like your thinking!

 

[AnneInTheBurbs]

Just a note for you all, I found these self sticking solar motion sensor lights at Ollies. They are fantastic and I think I will get a few more and stick them around my house as well. They do have a switch on the bottom to turn them on or off also. They are $10, and you can mount them by screws or just peel and stick with the attached adhesive. These suckers are LEDs and they are bright! Might be a good way to spook some predators. By the way, I think my raccoon problem is actually deer! My neighbor closed my coop door for me the other night and he said there were two big deer right there. Guess they like chicken feed too!

 

[Werforpsu]

In our flock a rooster is expected to be respectful and tolerant of handling, even if he isn't thrilled by it. Any which try to challenge us or show any questionable intent go straight to freezer camp. There are a lot of friendly birds out there to be found and I have no desire to breed on aggressive ones. Hens are the same...you can get some who are rather nasty and they don't get to continue their ways.
Just be careful to give a rooster a fair evaluation...him getting irrate when there is a lot of stimulation going on (such as multiple kids and or dogs running around) may be more about his instinctual concern over protecting his hens from what he thinks is an onslaught of threats rather than him being an aggressive bird. However a bird who will stalk, charge or attack you from behind or without any provoking factors is a problem in my book. I don't have the concern of small kids running around but I use that possibility as a guideline for how well I trust my roosters.
And no, I see no problems with friendly roosters being less protective of their girls.

Thanks for the input.

At first it was just the 7 year old. I reasoned that they either thought he was a threat or another cockerel and urged him to be respectful but stand his ground...running away would give them incentive to keep thinking that they were in charge. Well, he could only stand his ground so much...it was unnerving for him to have a rooster charge him since he is so small... wings can easily get to his head height!
Then it was the 9 year old. I questioned why only them, why not us....and then it started with us. Even if I am the only one around it happens. I would walk out to the coop in the morning, open the door for a day of free ranging and our #1 would watch and stalk me while the other chickens happily flew off into the yard. I would go over and collect eggs, he would follow me. At one point, he would charge me, usually backing off at the last second, sometimes only my foot kicking out would keep him away.

I do want to butcher him, but we also don't want to leave our flock unprotected through the winter. We have foxes, bears, coyotes, raccoons etc. While a rooster is no match for bears and coyotes, they are at least loud enough to keep smaller predators further away. We lost our 1 hen to a fox. She loved the woods and was hanging out there when she was grabbed.

 

[OneMountainAcres]

Just a note for you all, I found these self sticking solar motion sensor lights at Ollies. They are fantastic and I think I will get a few more and stick them around my house as well. They do have a switch on the bottom to turn them on or off also. They are $10, and you can mount them by screws or just peel and stick with the attached adhesive. These suckers are LEDs and they are bright! Might be a good way to spook some predators. By the way, I think my raccoon problem is actually deer! My neighbor closed my coop door for me the other night and he said there were two big deer right there. Guess they like chicken feed too!

I may need to make a trip to ollies now!

 

[fisherlady]

Thanks for the input. 

At first it was just the 7 year old.  I reasoned that they either thought he was a threat or another cockerel and urged him to be respectful but stand his ground...running away would give them incentive to keep thinking that they were in charge.  Well, he could only stand his ground so much...it was unnerving for him to have a rooster charge him since he is so small... wings can easily get to his head height!
Then it was the 9 year old.  I questioned why only them, why not us....and then it started with us.  Even if I am the only one around it happens.  I would walk out to the coop in the morning, open the door for a day of free ranging and our #1 would watch and stalk me while the other chickens happily flew off into the yard.  I would go over and collect eggs, he would follow me.  At one point, he would charge me, usually backing off at the last second, sometimes only my foot kicking out would keep him away.

I do want to butcher him, but we also don't want to leave our flock unprotected through the winter.  We have foxes, bears, coyotes, raccoons etc.  While a rooster is no match for bears and coyotes, they are at least loud enough to keep smaller predators further away.  We lost our 1 hen to a fox.  She loved the woods and was hanging out there when she was grabbed.

If you have need for flock protectors I have extra roosters I would be glad to give you... 1 or even 2 would do the job. We will be butchering them as extras in the next couple of weeks but there are a couple who could easily go to a new home

 

[Blarneyeggs]

Just a note for you all, I found these self sticking solar motion sensor lights at Ollies. They are fantastic and I think I will get a few more and stick them around my house as well. They do have a switch on the bottom to turn them on or off also. They are $10, and you can mount them by screws or just peel and stick with the attached adhesive. These suckers are LEDs and they are bright! Might be a good way to spook some predators. By the way, I think my raccoon problem is actually deer! My neighbor closed my coop door for me the other night and he said there were two big deer right there. Guess they like chicken feed too!

Sweet!

 

[Blarneyeggs]

Look what I found...