I'm a little late to this party, but thought I would share my story. I have 4 hens and one roo. We never intended to get a rooster, we thought we were getting another hen, and that of course turned out not to be the case. At first since he was the new kid on the block all the other hens would chase him and "bully" him to establish the pecking order. Now that he is older (about a year old or a little less?) he is the top dog, lol. He does get aggressive with my mom and I, and he has left some nasty scratches on me. The only thing that has saved him from becoming dinner is that he is GREAT with the girls. They free range during the day, and he does an excellent job at keeping them safe in the yard. Between stray dogs in the area and natural predatures, he keeps a good eye on them and directs them to safety when needed. He also makes sure they all get their share of bugs and food. When I fill their feeder he even goes and "checks it out"... when he deems it safe, he drops a few bits on the ground and calls the hens over to eat... it's rather cute, lol. (Who says chivalry is dead?)
That being said, he hasn't made our lives miserable. We do make sure we have a "weapon" when we go out just to be sure. We have this small plastic rake with a long handle that we carry around and use to push him back in case he decides to come after us. Now, when he does come after us, he goes for the rake instead of our legs. We are careful about turning our backs to him, and such. Generally, as long as we respect his space and keep a distance between him and us, he will respect it in return and all is good. But be sure, if it ever gets out of hand and it gets dangerous for us, then he will certainly become dinner and I have told him so!
