I am training my rooster not to crow, so far its not even a week & we already have good results.
Its been taking a lot of time & I've had to really persevere so far, mind.
My tactic is, every time he crows more than twice, I catch him, tap him on the beak and tell him "Bad Peter! Quiet!" & then remove him from his ladies. Either I bring him indoors or tie him to the "Naughty Rooster Post" for a bit. Sometimes he needs scolding 2 - 3 times until he finally gets the message, but that's happening less & less often. This is a year old Rooster & my first time training any sort of bird.
Originally, he was crowing a lot, all day, everyday. Now he only crows once or twice a day. In less than a week.
When he is being very quiet I say "Good Boy Peter, quiet, Good Boy!" In a pleased tone & give him lots of fuss as I would with our dogs. Sometimes he will get a treat,
When he does crow now, its only if I'm not nearby, he seems to think I can't hear him at a distance, but boy does he get a shock when I catch him & tell him off. He tries to avoid being caught, but I always make sure he can't get away with the behavior.
The way I see it is it may be natural for roosters to crow, but its also natural for dogs to bark / howl & if you can train a dog to be quiet, then you can train a rooster to be quiet. If I didn't have close on - the - other - side - of - the - fence - neighbors then I wouldn't care about his crowing, but sadly I live in a town.
I might state though that our rooster is a bit of an oddball, he sleeps in the dog bed with a Rottweiler & a staffy & he also searches out a warm lap to sit on if there is one available. We have never had any problems with aggression with him,
At night he sleeps under the stairs where its dark & cool in a pet carrier & doesn't crow at all of a morning. Otherwise, If I want waking up, I'll leave him out overnight & he'll crow on the other side of the bedroom door at 9:10AM of a morning (DH swears he has an alarm clock stuffed down his throat, or if he hasn't then he will have one down there soon!) & get me up. I'm trying to teach him that "Quiet" means QUIET. Once I've given that command, I don't take any messing about from him with noise.
He is quite funny when he gets caught & picked up, his head will stretch out over my shoulder & stare back at the hens as I carry him reluctantly back into the house.
DH described the look in his eyes as " Oh, no! She's got me again, Nooooooooo!"
Poor Peter,
if only he knew what a £2000 noise disturbance fine is.......