Wonky rooster and fertility.

[Farmgal Val]

Rooster issues, ugh!

Decided to use adult Rooster instead of buying chicks this year.
Our red rooster is a bit wonky but he is full adult, will fight you and topped every hen we had over the course of two weeks, we usually keep him separate.

14 days later we put him back by himself.
He's not quite right in the head, he walks like John Wayne did and in his youth managed to tear off both of his spurs.

The eggs I gathered had time for the hens to fertilize their eggs from the rooster mating, they were in my Little giant for 16 days at 101 degrees. (I've hatched eggs a few times before so I'm not too much a noobie)

Just candled them today, all 48 were yolkers and only a few had the usual tiny blood spot hens sometimes leave in unfertile eggs.

Could it be my spurless rooster needed his spurs to correctly rub vents with the girls or maybe he is sterile?
He is doing the deed properly from my observations.

I have 2 more full incubators running, hoping they might be viable.

I sure hated wasting that many eggs.

If they are all unfertile I'm thinking about a nice French dinner dish called
Coq Au Vin (Rooster in Wine)

 

[EggSighted4Life]

Hi there.

Gosh, you DON'T want that crap breeding forward anyways!

Man fighters not welcome here EVER. The meaner the roo the sweeter the stew. Do it... life is too short to deal with mean animals.

I feed blanks back to my flock and other animals (dogs)... even those that slightly developed but quit very early, either scrambled or boiled. But it is usually only a few at most since eggs are 34% protein but 64% fat.

If your thermometer isn't calibrated could be part of your issue. I use 102 for still air and 99.5 for circulated. Hard to believe they were all infertile!

The tiny blood spots were *possibly* just early quitters? I would crack them open and look instead of relying on candling.

No his spurs don't matter. But during processing I have noticed that a shriveled waddle or uneven size waddles is often related to the size of the testees!

If you have plenty of hens... why keep a rooster by himself? Just curios, here to learn how and why people do things differently.

What color are the eggs you're working with? All the same breed hens? What is their age? Possible nutrition is a factor? What do ya feed regularly including treats and supplements?

What day are your other bators on now?

 

[cmom]

I had a young male in with some females and the boy did his job. There were some blanks but most hatched out fine. He really didn't have any spurs yet, just nubs.

 

[Chickassan]

Maybe he's delivering the mail but the ladies aren't opening the box.
Hens are fully capable of "faking" it, going through the mating process but never completeing it.
Your girls might have higher standards than you realise.

 

[Chickassan]

Here have a read, it really is very cool. All the flaws in your rooster, well they see those too and can reject his genetic material so they're not stuck with awful future flock members.https://www.livescience.com/15828-chickens-eject-sperm.html