When can you sex Barred Rocks?

[woolymama]

I bought 4 Barred Rock pullets in October - they were 17 weeks old at the time, and they all certainly looked like girls to me. Yesterday one started crowing. By my estimate they are 23 weeks old. Ummm..........is he a late bloomer or what????? I bought the 17 weekers because I figured we'd know for sure by then the roos from the girls.
Must be something at my house - I have 2 cochin roos that didn't develop roo-ish traits until they were well over 20 weeks old as well.
Should I stick to buying older birds or what???? I've got 5 roosters to 11 hens now!!!!

 

[mom2jedi]

Can you get pictures of him? It would help.

 

[HEChicken]

Barred rocks can be sexed fairly early on because the colors are different. Hens are darker than roos. At 17 weeks you should be able to see hackle/saddle feathers, and the tail feathers on the roos should be getting longer and curved. The dominant hen in a group will sometimes crow in the absence of a rooster - do you still have the other roosters you referenced? However as the PP said, photos help a lot....

 

[RAREROO]

Most of the time, Barred Rocks can be sexed as day olds as shown in my pics below. Throughout their whole lives, barred rock males will be lighter in color than the females.

Here are pics of dayold chicks. It may take some time to get a "trained eye" for this, but once you do, they are fairly easy to sex as chicks.

These are pullets, notice the solid backs and smaller spot on their head, they also have darker legs.

These are little roos, they have a smokey back and larger spot on their head and generally have lighter legs.

I don't have any updated pics of older birds yet but I'll try to get some.


.

 

[aceschix]

OMG I can not believe I was looking for a place to put this very same question.

I have 6 barred rock and 2 buff rocks in my mixed flock. One barred rock(the very darkest) has been crowing for quite some time now. We decided that one rooster would come in handy to raise chicks in the spring. Mine are 25 weeks old and 3 more have started crowing just this week (2 Buffs & a Barred). There is one more whose comb is getting suspiciously bigger and more red.

Is this a Rock thing that they mature and crow late?

I have heard about the spot when they are a day old. That will help when i have chicks. What should I be looking for now, to be sure?

All the swaps in my area are over...i do not know what I will do with all these roosters. 5 roosters to 13 hens is not going to work for me!

 

[woolymama]

Lighter legs, eh? Yeah the one that began crowing had lighter legs, as does one other. (Crap!!)
I'll try to get a picture up.

 

[CityClucks]

I'll bet the two that are crowing are also lighter colored than the others...Barred Rock pullets are darker than roos.

Oh...I just saw that HEChicken already mentioned this...

 

[ArizonaDesertChicks]

2 pullets at 14 weeks old - combs & wattles were small - didn't grow larger & red until they were a few weeks away from laying eggs

These are two 19 week old pullets - 2-3 weeks before laying.

at 22 weeks old and laying

The tail & back end of a 22 week old pullet/hen - you can see the darker coloring also.

 

[can you hear me now?]

I read once there is another way for sexing them at day old chicks by the spots on their heads. The way to do this is the more gathered the spot in the center(more pronounced) the more likely to be a pullet. The more broken the spot, the more likely to be a cockerel. When I read this it said this method is about 90 percent accurate.

 

[woolymama]

I went out and took a good look at my "girls", and I am rather sad to say they all look like boys. Pointy hackle and saddle feathers. Sigh.
The confirmed roo is first, and 2 others follow. A third seems to be MIA.