too many roos!

[notducky]

I've ended up with 5 males in my flock of 19. We've already eaten one roo. I'm stuck on what to do. On one hand I don't need this many and they are more mouths to feed. But on the other hand they haven't done anything to deserve the stew pot. They are good boys. I know that my thinking is skewed on that. But they also aren't large enough to make much of a meal. Give them away? I'm worried that I'm giving them to someone else's stew pot and maybe they won't be as humane. Can someone please tell me I'm not the only person that has felt this way? How do I get over it?

 

[Ol Grey Mare]

You'll either need to construct a bachelor pad for them for the sake of your girls or find a way to make peace with being rid of them. You can try to find placement for them where they won't be dinner, but that is easier said than done with excess cockerels.

 

[bobbi-j]

And that's the tough part of chicken keeping. What to do with the extra roos. We eat ours. I didn't put the time, money and feed into them to just give them away. At least I know that they've had a good life while they've been here, up until that one really bad day... You really only have few options. Keep them in a separate bachelor pad, eat them, or sell/give them away.

 

[lazy gardener]

While they haven't done anything to deserve the stew pot, the reality is, that either they will end up in your pot, or some one else's. And, I agree with Bobbi. That's often the most difficult part of keeping chickens, but a tough reality. The other side of the coin is that you'll be getting a home raised meal, you know it's been raised humanely, and even processed humanely, and it's not been fed antibiotics and other junk along the way. we can't say the same for the neat little packages of chicken at the grocery store.

 

[bobbi-j]

While they haven't done anything to deserve the stew pot, the reality is, that either they will end up in your pot, or some one else's. And, I agree with Bobbi. That's often the most difficult part of keeping chickens, but a tough reality. The other side of the coin is that you'll be getting a home raised meal, you know it's been raised humanely, and even processed humanely, and it's not been fed antibiotics and other junk along the way. we can't say the same for the neat little packages of chicken at the grocery store.

That's because no chickens were harmed in the making of those little packages, right?

 

[Mrs. K]

Everyone winds up in this predicament. Sometimes people on here ask about getting a rooster, and I have told them, ask around locally because even experienced poultiers have extra roos in their flock, that they just hate to cull at some point and time. And one tends to delay getting it done.

However, the truth of the matter, wishing that they would all just continue to get along won't work either. If you leave it too long, then there will be fighting, over mated hens, and constant tension in the flock. The successful trick is to wait as long as possible but to do it before the negative behaviors begin.

Some people keep a bachelor pad, but I have no idea why. The original poster's question was how to get over the squeamishness in culling the healthy birds, begin by distancing your self from all of them. Saying to yourself, that is dinner over there. Sometimes it helps to do just one or two at a time. Think of it as a flock, not so much as individual birds.

The other posters are very right about these things:

1. They will not continue to get along, there will be fighting.
2. Your hens will be over-mated and look awful.
3. There will be tension in the flock.
4. You really cannot keep them all, unless you have a coop/run set up out of sight and hearing of the laying flock.

So you either eat them yourself, or let someone else do it....... but then you get to get new chicks. I love getting new chicks, but to get them, you have to subtract from the flock.

Mrs K

 

[donrae]

We also follow the "A really good life and one very bad day" theory. They were born male, their days were numbered right there. I'd love to keep a yard full of roosters, they're pretty and have more personality than the hens IMO, but they're freeloaders and I just don't have the space and money to feed them. We get a meal per bird, pretty much. I pressure cook them and pull the meat from the bones, I usually get about a quart of meat per cockerel. That makes a great pan of enchiladas or some other chicken dish.

 

[aart]

Rooster -N- Noodles.....yummmmmm.......or if they are under 4 months old you can put them on the grill and still make soup/stew out of the bones/feet/neck.

I found that the difficulty of killing a living thing(and it IS difficult) was trumped by the satisfaction of 'making' my own food and taking responsibility for the harder things about keeping livestock....and the relief and peace that prevails after of getting excess cockerels out of the flock dynamic is not to be underestimated.

Like the 'good life, and one bad day' theory....when harvesting chickens it's 'hard to slit that throat' but once the feathers are off, 'it's just meat'.

 

[Mrs. K]

I agree, the killing it the tough part, then it is kind of exciting. And I feel just like a pioneer woman!

 

[TheZMom]

Can you eat a rooster over a certain age?