Spurs??

Vetai

In the Brooder
9 Years
Oct 19, 2010
23
1
22
Republic, MO
At what age do young roosters start to develop their spurs? I've hatched 7 EE's and bought 5 other chicks (1 BO,1 RIR, 2 polish & 1 other "Rainbow layer). Of the 5 bought, 2 were polish s/r. I would really like to be able to tell if I have any roosters in the bunch. Are there any dead give aways by feathers? Right now they are a week to 10 days old of is it just too soon to tell? Thanks for any input.
big_smile.png
 
With my chicks, I had one I "knew" was a rooster (marked by the hatchery) and a couple of straight run chicks. Turns out one of the straight run chicks is probably a rooster too. Mine are only a couple of days older than yours, and this is what I've observed.
The rooster chicks are feathering in slower. One of them especially. But the big tell is the tail feathers. The pullets have them, the roosters don't. One of them was so significantly behind in feathering out, I was starting to worry it was sick! Till I read up on that sort of thing here, and now I"m pretty sure it's a rooster rather than a sick chick.

Your mileage may vary.
 
It sometimes depends more on the breed but they really don't develop spurs for quite some time to come. It could be a year or more but you should be able to ID the sex of the bird well before that so spur's isn't a timely manner in which to ID sex. Heck they will begin to crow and get frisky with the hen's by 5-6 mo old.

AL
 
Good to know info, Thanks! I definitely have a couple with no tail feathers yet. My oldest (10 days old), a black EE or Olive egger, we can't seem to confirm. I got the eggs from a BYC'er that swears she only sent me EE's. All of the eggs were blue. I've just never seen a all black EE's. I actually hope that he is a Roo. Thanks again.
smile.png
 
it really depends on the breed. I've had chicks that you could see their roo crest at 3 weeks. If you watch them they often behave different. Standing up really straight to look around, being more watchful and nervous. Other breeds it's been months before I could even guess what sex they might be. The welsummers in the Brooder right now are easily sexed by color which is good, because the roos show no behavioral difference at all.
 

New posts New threads Active threads

Back
Top Bottom