Problem with rooster & introducing new pullets

[BeccaSmith]

We just moved our 10 -11 week pullets & one cockerel to the adult coop in a temporary pen where they can get aquanted. A few weeks ago, a neighbors roo decided he was going to adopt our adult hens and start living with them in our coop. This wasn't a problem until we moved the pullets & cockerel to the temp pen in the coop on Saturday. When the rooster goes in for the night, he makes such a fuss that it get's the pullets all worked up and they pile on top of each other because they get scared and freaked out. Saturday night, my husband pulled one of the pullets from the bottom of the pile, it appeard to be dead, on it's back and feet up. He brought it outside and it came back to life. The rooster got locked outside for the night, our yard is fully fenced, he keeps coming back by jumping over the fence. We don't mind him, but again tonight he caused the pullets to freak out. He isn't our rooster, we don't mind him staying unless he keeps disturbing the new pullets, any advice on how to keep things calm? If he continues to cause a frenzy with our new babies and if we can't get rid of him, then it will leave us with only one option since he won't go home and the owners a few houses down has several roosters and they don't lock them up or keep them fenced in their yard. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

 

[jdavis]

chicken and dumplins sound good to me. this rooster causing stress on your young pullets can affect their maturity rate and could cause other problems as well. if you cant resolve the problem with the rooster i would suggest moving your pullets away form him, and with him not being your rooster it sounds like he is just a nuisance anyway. like i said chicken and dumplins.

 

[marlo1968]

I agree with jdavis....chicken and dumplins sounds good to me too!! If the owners won't take action, then you must to protect/preserve your pullets. I don't know about your state, but Colorado is a "if you don't want them in you must fence them out" state. So it may be totally up to you to do something. Also in Colorado if it's on your property and it poses a threat to your livestock you can shoot it....

Best course of action might be talk to your neighbor and see what they will/won't do, or what they mind you doing about the situation. Best wishes to you

 

[BeccaSmith]

We'll talk to our neighbors first, maybe they will fence their chickens in, or what is left of them after the coyotes got to them. We fenced our entire pasture to keep the coyotes and foxes out, but the rooster still flies over the fence. I don't mind him, I kind of like him and he has brought peace between our girls for the most part, but before he adopted us, we bought a baby roo and we are sure this won't go well with the neighbors rooster, but you never know. Recently another neighbor fenced their chickens in because they had a rooster that beat the crap out of the other neighbors roosters, they were all just running around the neighborhood wildly. So when this rooster joined our girls, he wasn't in the best of shape but he has healed and now doesn't want to go home!

Thanks for the advice, I wasn't sure if there was some type of trick I could do to calm him down at night!

 

[marlo1968]

Is there a way you can seperate your flock and give him his own group and the baby roo his own group? That is if the neighbors don't mind if you just claim him as yours since he seems to have adopted you.....hope all goes well, best wishes.

 

[Gersbud]

Sounds like the rooster has found a new home. Sounds like the neighbors don't much care about the rooster anyway. But if he were causing so much distress to my new pullets he would have to go or I would have to build something to keep him in to keep him out of contact with the pullets.

 

[BeccaSmith]

The rooster was quiet last night! Amazing! Keeping him out for two nights in a row must have done the trick! I don't have a way to make seperate areas when the baby roo get's older, we just aren't set up for that! So if the adopted roo is to mean to our younger one, he will be finding a new home!

 

[marlo1968]

Ahh, well, hopefully he will stay quite and play nice, best wishes