Which Roosters Do I isolate?

[Nupe]

You said one of the wellies were hitting on the girls. If you're talking about the dance where they drop one wing and prance around, that alone is enough to trigger an event. Your dominant roo watches closely for behavior like that in order to stop it. It seems interrupting them isn't enough, he also has to rough them up. I would say that roo definitely needs to go. If your goal is to breed them, that's not a good trait to continue. I recommend dumplings.

 

[microchick]

Yes. I haven't caught the Wellie roosters dancing yet, but I have seen the two dominate Buffs drop a wing and dance for the ladies. I have seen the Buffs attack when the Wellie roosters tries to grab on of the hens (no finesse but they are not given the chance to learn any better due to being attacked) when they think they aren't being watched. Usually the Buffs respond to the hens screaming at the Wellie rooster which is understandable and normal but once they interrupt, they don't just chase them off and start courting the hen themselves which I have seen roosters do, but full fledged war breaks out that ends with the offending Welsummer rooster or the lowest on the Totum Pole Buff rooster being pinned down in a corner getting the stuffing pecked out of him. I have never seen the Welsummer roosters or the number 3 Buff rooster fight back which is what puzzles me. They submit but submission doesn't stop the aggression.

The fact that the aggression may be be genetic in nature bothers me. I do hope to raise a few clutches of eggs which means I need good genetics to pass down to the chicks. Do I want aggressiveness passed on? No. But my husband posed a question that I couldn't answer. Isn't some aggression in the form of protectiveness beneficial in a rooster in order to protect the hens from threats from predators?

If it is, where do you draw the line?

Understand, I'm thinking back a lot of years to the last time I had chickens in my life and for the life of me I cannot remember having this problem with multiple roosters around. There was the occasional squabble with a lot of feather ruffling, wing flapping etc, but none of this cornering and all out attempted violence. And those birds were in a smaller contained area than our birds are now.

I would have no problem with the #3 Buff becoming flock Alpha as long as the 'chase you down and kill you' attitude disappears. I have seen him chase the Wellies but after one lap around the pen the Buffs attitude is like, 'yeah, well, this is too much trouble' and goes back to whatever he was doing. When this happens though I have also observe the two bigger Buffs join in and that is usually when I grab a pole and intervene so nobody gets seriously hurt.

So far they have broken off the attack once they see me. I have been tough with the boys since they sprouted their first feathers. But in all honesty, I am expecting the day to come where they don't back down but turn their behaviors on me.

I'm trying to prevent that from happening to me or my husband.

 

[junebuggena]

Some protectiveness is good, but what happens if these guys start seeing their own male chicks as threats? They don't stop when the other boys submit. What would happen if those lower ranking boys weren't around to take the beatings? Who would be the next target? They are simply too unpredictable. And they will only get worse as they get older. Right now, they are only aggressive towards other males, but knowing they will only get more aggressive, do you really want to wait and find out how bad it will get?

 

[Nupe]

The last time you had chickens, how long did you have them? A lot of these problems will go away once your flock becomes mature with several generations. A flock starting out with all members the same age will always have aggression problems. That being said, I really do think the "chase you down and kill you" attitude needs to be removed permanently or at least not bred further.

 

[aart]

I think it's difficult to asses young cockerels the way you are doing it.
Keeping multiple males together and changing who is penned with whom is escalating the fighting and not going to produce viable assessments.

I'd suggest choosing one and eating or rehoming the rest.
If the one you keep doesn't work out after months of observation, then get rid of him and find another mature cock and try them in the flock.

if you're determined to keep them all for breeding purpose choices, pen them all separately, out of sight if necessary to keep them from fighting thru fences.
Once they mature, and the pullets mature....then try them one at a time with the flock, again giving time for assimilation and observation.

 

[microchick]

The last time I had a flock around it as for longer than three years. I can't remember exactly how long it was at the time but it was definitely longer than three years so yes, I have seen flocks mature.

Good question about turning the aggression towards chicks.

 

[microchick]

Update:

I spent three days rotating the roosters in a bachelors pen and it seems to have helped. While the Buff Orpingtons are not especially thrilled with the Welsummer roosters and vise versa, an uneasy truce has broken out to the point that I'm slowing my permanent pen construction. I'm not letting the Welsummer boys roost with all three of the 3 chicken stooges aka the Buff O's. At night they have to go into the bottom half of the roost with the younger pullets and a couple of older hens. Our coop is a condo of sorts with two stories. Each coop is 4X8 As the flock grew and outgrew the upper level, which was built over 3 feet of the ground, the lower half was finished and younger birds moved into it along with a couple of older hens. The older hens are not thrilled by having to sleep with the 'teenagers' but hey, life is tough, LOL.

The roosters are still pecking at one another on occasion. Yesterday I saw the youngest Buff roo sneak up behind the roo that shares Alpha with another Buff, jump on his back, give him a peck on the head and then run like heck. The bigger roo took a step towards him as if planning to chase him down and show him who was boss, seemed to change his mind as if saying. 'It's not worth the effort' and went back to scratching around in the grass. But the last two days have been noticeably quieter. I'm not believing for a moment that this is an end to the rivalry but merely a break in the action to regroup. But I'm enjoying it while it lasts. If the extreme aggression flairs up again, we will repeat splitting them up for a few days to see if the reset button gets pushed again.

I really don't understand these companies that build these little pre fab chicken coops that boast they can hold up to 10 hens. You look inside and there is a single roost board that looks to be three feet long and that's it. Our chickens have a huge run and the equivalent of 8X16 feet of coop space and they still act like they need more room.

 

[microchick]

Knowing when to throw in the towel with aggressive roosters:

Final report. I wound up having to isolate two roosters to a bachelor pen after an attack on one of our Wellie roosters that had the poor boy trying to wedge himself under the overhang on our coop floor in an attempt to protect himself from being ganged up on.

I continued to be a presence around the two exiles, trying to keep them tame and non aggressive towards humans in hopes of rehoming them. The larger of the two was wanting to peck and nip if I reached out to touch him when he was standing close by. Yesterday when he did this, not just pecking once or twice but in rapid succession, I grabbed him with a hand on his back near his shoulders (I only had one free hand at that moment) and pushed him down which immediately stopped the behavior. To my surprise the smaller rooster immediately launched himself at me feet first. Whether he was aggitated by the larger roos behavior felt threatened or whatever I don't know. I wound up with some mild scratches on my arm. This was the first serious human aggression shown by any of the roosters but I was willing to give the benefit of doubt given that butthead may have thought I was a threat to his best bud at that moment.

I went about my business, left the pen and came back with fresh water for them. Once again the larger rooster came up to me but was acting non aggressive so I reached out to pet his back and tell him he was a good boy which he was agreeable to without pecking. Once again the smaller rooster came flying at me feet first. This time I was watching for him out of the corner of my eye, however, and I was able to block him with my forearm across his chest hard which surprised him into submission.

That was the final straw for me. No matter what was going on in that little chicken brain of his that is an unforgiveable behavior. I have three nice roosters who so far are getting along and not acting human aggressive. At 18 weeks I know that can change, but life is too short to deal with bad behavior that can only escalate. I may still try to rehome rooster #1 but #2 is not going to live long and prosper which is very disappointing to me as once upon a time he was my favorite.