Which cockrel stays

[GreySoul]

These four guys are all 22 weeks old and none have crowed, fought, or laid an egg . At what point will these guys have their hormones kick in so I can pick a flock protector?

 

[Alexander2000]

Pic one is beatiful.

 

[ramboas93]

If your looking for a good flock protector and don't care about anything else. Id wait until they mature and they figure out amongst themselves who the top dog is and that would be the best one for protecting the flock and get rid of the rest, its what i usually do with my free range flock, unless im looking for one for specific breed standards for breeding. but i usually keep them in separate runs. each bird and breed is different and will mature at different rates. but usually around 6months.

 

[mandelyn]

I pool all our boys into bachelor groups and since we're dual purpose I really watch their behavior, how they treat each other and how they're maturing in terms of their body structure and growth rate. The end goal being finding those future gentleman flock leaders of good quality for their breed, as well as having some amazing dinners. Seems to work out to be 33% are future leaders, 33% too mean/hormonal, 33% wonky in same way or too weak in social standing. It changes with smaller groups. So for every group that grows out (more than 10), roughly 66% are invited to dinner. I have a group of 14 boys running together now, so far at 3-4 months old there are 3-4 decent ones starting to show themselves. Here in 2 more months I can start making selections on who's sticking around for next year or who's getting matched up to extra pullets and moving on to be a flock leader elsewhere.

I've noticed our birds are getting bigger and the shape is really rounding out and getting wider, instead of the thinner/leaner/longer production layer type we've been culling out. I have a lighter weight layer type project bird I'm working on but have an outcross in mind that should flip it around to more dual purpose in type.

If you're the type to invite spares to dinner, I'd keep the nicest one who treat the others good, who isn't a total wimp and who has the widest distance between the legs. Just in case they make babies next year.

 

[Mrs. K]

Visually, I like the wheaten, and I think it was ridge runner who said early maturity is a good trait.

However, you really need to handle them, feathers hide a lot of sins. Manually check their breasts, look at their feet and legs, straight toes do not cause problems later or in passing on. Look at the placement of the spurs. Check the closure of their beaks, need to line up perfectly. Check the width of their back and their skull. Make sure the left side matches the right side. And weigh them. They are all the same age? Then they should have had exposure to the same amount of feed. The heavier one is more thrifty.

Mrs. K