Reintroducing cockerel

[Hamilspud]

Hi everyone! I have a 7 month old cockerel, 5 pullets, and 2 hens. Things were going great with the cockerel and he was still a bit afraid of the hens until recently. The hens got bumble foot and had bandages on their feet, and within one day of the bandaging I caught my cockerel rather ruthlessly beating up on one of the hens. My theory is that the bandages made her unsteady on her feet and he saw his opportunity to exert dominance over her, but when he started to draw blood I pulled him out. Ive since kept him separate from the ladies while the hens’ feet healed, and they’ve finally got their bandages off.

Does anyone have any advice on how to best reintroduce him? We have a run attached to our coop and a separate tractor run in the yard, so he and the girls have been alternating between the tractor run and coop run where he can see and talk to the them a bit but they can’t reach one another. He’s not shown any aggression prior to the incident and is incredibly affectionate to humans but I know this could just be the first sign of him turning mean. If that is the case and it doesn’t work out in the long wrong I’m prepared for that, but we really love this guy so I want to set him up for success as best I can.

 

[Mrs. K]

Try it an see. Let him back in, see what happens.

There is no 'right' way to do this so that the rooster's behavior will improve. Often times, age will improve a rooster. He gets through the wild hormone stage. Often times, winter with the limited sunlight if you are in the north, will dampen the hormones.

But as a fail proof do this, and get that, not so much. So let him back in, see how it goes, if he is up to his old tricks, pull him again, and wait until November/December, try again. If that does not work, then you got a rotten one and decide what to do.

Mrs K

 

[Hamilspud]

Try it an see. Let him back in, see what happens.

There is no 'right' way to do this so that the rooster's behavior will improve. Often times, age will improve a rooster. He gets through the wild hormone stage. Often times, winter with the limited sunlight if you are in the north, will dampen the hormones.

But as a fail proof do this, and get that, not so much. So let him back in, see how it goes, if he is up to his old tricks, pull him again, and wait until November/December, try again. If that does not work, then you got a rotten one and decide what to do.

Mrs K

Thanks! That was my plan, to pull him again for a few more months if he’s still being a jerk to let him mature more. We’re planning to move North to more land this year (in FL right now) so if he does end up a total jerk to my girls once he’s finished growing, I’m hoping to create a separate bachelor flock to keep him in. He’s lucky that he’s my cuddly baby, otherwise I wouldn’t be putting in all this effort many cockerels have passed through our brooder and I never had any interest in keeping one but this dude stole my heart, haha.

 

[Alaskan]

Try it an see. Let him back in, see what happens.

There is no 'right' way to do this so that the rooster's behavior will improve. Often times, age will improve a rooster. He gets through the wild hormone stage. Often times, winter with the limited sunlight if you are in the north, will dampen the hormones.

But as a fail proof do this, and get that, not so much. So let him back in, see how it goes, if he is up to his old tricks, pull him again, and wait until November/December, try again. If that does not work, then you got a rotten one and decide what to do.

Mrs K

X2.