Please look and tell me if these are hens or roos!

[5parkers]

HI! I live in a quiet subdivision and DEFINATELY can not have roos! I ordered chicks before, all pullets, and ended up with 2 roos. Now I have a new batch from a local farmer and they are supposed to be all hens. There is one RIR and one Buff O in question. You can probably tell which two I'm talking about by looking at the pics. Their combs are much more prodominant then the others, and they squabble with each other quite a bit- bumping each other's chests. The farmer told me he usually sexes them very accurately, but if he is wrong I can bring them back and switch them out. I just want to make sure before they get much older. They are about 6 weeks old right now. Thanks so much for your advice!

 

[Judy]

I would be suspicious they are roos, too, but I wonder whether there is any way to be certain yet.

I wonder if it is too early to tell by pointed saddle feathers; you might check that out. Or even/uneven flight feathers -- if you spread the wing open and they are uneven it is supposed to be female; even, male. Mine are 6 weeks and I can see the even/uneven flight feathers clearly. The ones with larger/redder combs also have even looking flight feathers. Remains to be seen whether this will prove to be correct, of course.

 

[sonew123]

They both look like roos to me :-( better trade em quick

 

[PotterWatch]

Quote:
Sexing birds by their feathering, I believe, is only accurate when certain birds are bred, not all birds. It is also only accurate for the first couple days of life. After that, it is just coincidence.

I would want to see larger pictures of the birds in question to say for sure, but they could be roos.

Edited to add: I clicked on the pictures to make them bigger (duh

). Those two do look like roos at this point, but if it were me, I would wait a bit longer to make sure.

 

[Willjg]

Hey there,

Sorry, but they look like little roos to me too.
But they look real nice tho!

Bill.

 

[ArizonaDesertChicks]

Those two are definitely roos - besides the large combs, they also have developed wattles.

 

[mrsgibber]

I'm no expert but I'd say they are probably roos given that their combs an wattles are so much larger than the others of the same age.

 

[5parkers]

Thanks so much everyone!
I traded them out just to make sure!