Topic of the Week - Aggressive Roosters: What is the best way to handle them?

[17 chickens]

It is Important not to show fear to the rooster and not run, I have had many of roosters and have had one that was bad. I have found that if you just stand in place or walk towards them when the come at you it shows that you are not afraid and shows the rooster that you are number one one the pecking order. Be patient this will take several times to re-train him who is BOSS!
You might want to wear pants for protection as he might try to jump at you. Hope this will help!

 

[PrairieChickens]

I host classes of small children at my house to teach them about chickens, so I cannot have a rooster with ANY human aggression. In the past, I have successfully taught aggressive roosters to respect me, but I can't force them to respect other people. Once they demonstrate a willingness to challenge or attack human beings, they get slated for processing.

 

[allosaurusrock]

I've not had chickens all that long, but I have had two roosters. The first was a buff orp when I was in elementary school, so I don't remember him all that well. Of course, his name was Princess Flufferella. The most recent rooster I had was a black australorp. He was the sweetest thing to people, but he nearly killed one of my hens, so my dad ended up killing him.

 

[centrarchid]

I host classes of small children at my house to teach them about chickens, so I cannot have a rooster with ANY human aggression.  In the past, I have successfully taught aggressive roosters to respect me, but I can't force them to respect other people.  Once they demonstrate a willingness to challenge or attack human beings, they get slated for processing.

I do similar with educating kids and will always be ready to cull a rooster used for such. Those I use are either hand-reared or hen-reared by a hand-reared hen where the hen is periodically called in with chicks so hen can relax chicks by not given alarm calls when I am present.


Thus far the roosters I use as teaching tools have not been problematic. Not all breeds respond the same to the procedure.

 

[allosaurusrock]

I have a little sister who is three, and liked to run around the yard shirtless. She is now afraid of chickens because my BA rooster tried to eat her freckle. BYE DAVID.

 

[teresa toth]

I gave a mean rooster a year. This was a foolish decision, and mostly avoidance of the only real option, which was killing him. A lot of people talk about behaviors to stop the rooster from his attacks. Those might work for a determined and knowledgeable adult, but there was nothing to stop him from continually attacking my kids. After they had been attacked, they basically never went in the backyard again, thereby giving up all these activities: play in the playhouse, pick up eggs, give the hens treats (they like the hens), pick blackberries, put the chickens away at night and open their coop to the yard in morning, play in backyard. Our chickens free range in the fenced backyard.
I tried a lot of the techniques talked about here. I never gave way, I never backed down, and I made sure that he ran away from me after every encounter. But telling my little kids to do all that? One is only 5. They have no chance against our strong and agile meanie.
The day we got rid of Demonic Christopher was the day I experienced the Incredible Lightness of Being. You cannot imagine how happy I was, even with the blood spattered on me from the butchering process, to know that I, and the kids, would no longer get attacked. And I have never killed an animal, and I fall apart over my pets dying. Giving him away was out of the question, as I have heard there is cockfighting in my area. We weren't about to spend time/money building a separate coop to house a mean bird that then would have lost what little purpose it had, and would have lost its freedom to range also.
The next day, the kids were trotting out with baskets to get eggs, giving the hens treats, and picking blackberries.
DO NOT DO WHAT i DID AND GIVE THE MEANIE A YEAR OF TERRORIZING YOU. It does not get better. If anything it gets worse. The last straw was when I gave them the treat of watermelon rinds, carefully backed away 20 feet as I never turn my back on Demonic Christopher, then I turned and walked the last few feet to the gate and found myself attacked from behind. That was it. I called husband and said "Today's the day. I won't be attacked again."

 

[MainStSilkies]

We have a Silkie Rooster just over 4 mos old. He is starting to charge at out feet when we walk by, he'll stalk us with a sideways walk and look them snap at our ankles. He seems to do this to the ones that have handled him from the beginning, not to strangers in the yard.
I have tried carrying him under my arm, putting him in a basket under my desk, but that doesn't last long til he charges. Have a water gun which he hates do that may work. He will sometimes eat out of my hand,..he's my favourite but others are becoming afraid of him. On top of that he is loud, crowing during the day-seems to be he wants attention and/or out of the rum. They go out when I can be there and there are no other people around, usually 5-8:30pm.
I try to put him in the coop when he gets loud.
Any thoughts on what we can do. He's really quite funny and I'm hoping to break him of this!

 

[cra-zchicknlady]

We have a Silkie Rooster just over 4 mos old. He is starting to charge at out feet when we walk by, he'll stalk us with a sideways walk and look them snap at our ankles. He seems to do this to the ones that have handled him from the beginning, not to strangers in the yard.
I have tried carrying him under my arm, putting him in a basket under my desk, but that doesn't last long til he charges. Have a water gun which he hates do that may work. He will sometimes eat out of my hand,..he's my favourite but others are becoming afraid of him. On top of that he is loud, crowing during the day-seems to be he wants attention and/or out of the rum. They go out when I can be there and there are no other people around, usually 5-8:30pm.
I try to put him in the coop when he gets loud.
Any thoughts on what we can do. He's really quite funny and I'm hoping to break him of this!

This doesn't really sound like aggression to me. I have a few that will peck to check out different shoes I'm wearing. Is it just once or twice, or has he drawn blood or bruised someone? Maybe he's trying to play. For the crowing, try a crow collar. It won't cut down on frequency of crowing, but it should help with volume.

 

[3girlz]

So much good advice here !!!! We originally started our flock with 3 Isa Browns . We loved them !! We had them for 1.5 years and one of them (Mattie) hurt her self and ended up dying . We bought 5 week old chicks and hand raised them and successfully added them to the remaining 2 hens from tips on this site !!!
Everything was wonderful until we lost another older hen while on vacation last week . Since then , Hank , one of the new additions, started being mean to the last older hen . He even held her down and let a younger hen peck her as well !! I took him out after witnessing yet another attack !! The hens seemed to be ok but every time Hank would come around the pen the same younger hen would attack my older hen !
She is just the sweetest thing !! And I really love her ! Even tho we raised the chicks I love the older hen so much more !! What do I do now ? I haven't seen him bother the other younger ones at all ! He puts them to bed a couple of times a day ? Is that normal ? He has attacked my 8 yr olds boots but that is all . I think I preferred the days of just hens !!

 

[drumstick diva]

Get rid of the rooster and enjoy things the way they used to be.