Young and adult roosters

[arrowti]

Hello. I was just thinking about my roosters... I have two adult roosters, although one is a bantam. I now have 2 11 week old roosters, one who is starting to crow. They were raised by a broody and have been living with the flock together and seem to get along with the other roosters but I'm not sure for how long.

At what age would you typically see an adult rooster treating a young rooster as competition? Will they be fully grown and able to protect themselves or have you had adult roosters beating on young roosters?

I am keeping at least one of the 11 week olds and I don't want him to get attacked by the adults before he's old enough to protect himself.

Currently the young roosters perch beside the adult standard roo, who is also their father.

 

[Shadrach]

Hello. I was just thinking about my roosters... I have two adult roosters, although one is a bantam. I now have 2 11 week old roosters, one who is starting to crow. They were raised by a broody and have been living with the flock together and seem to get along with the other roosters but I'm not sure for how long.

At what age would you typically see an adult rooster treating a young rooster as competition? Will they be fully grown and able to protect themselves or have you had adult roosters beating on young roosters?

I am keeping at least one of the 11 week olds and I don't want him to get attacked by the adults before he's old enough to protect himself.

Currently the young roosters perch beside the adult standard roo, who is also their father.

Are the 11 week old roosters related to the senior roosters?
How many hens do you have?

 

[arrowti]

The 11 week olds are the sons of one of the roosters, although they do not look alike.

Right now we have 15 hens, but have 5 more pullets who will be added to the flock soon. We used to have 3 roosters up until one died this winter. I definitely want to add more, I'd feel safer at 25 hens, but I'm not as worried as I would be if the adults were younger. The bantam hangs out typically with 1-2 hens only, and the standard simply doesn't 'get around' as much as he used to, so to speak.

 

[sumi]

In my experience the older roosters will tolerate the young ones until the youngsters reach sexual maturity and start going after the hens. If the young rooster starts challenging the older rooster for the top spot you will also have some conflict and that can get bloody, quickly. Provided you have enough space for them to roam and enough hens to go round, they may sort themselves out and live together peacefully with another rooster in the flock, but time will tell. It's hard to say at what age the young ones will start trying to tread the hens, I've had one try it in the growing out pen once, aged about 10 weeks or so. He made quite an impressive effort but got the tar beat out of him by the hen for his troubles. She was raising a batch of chicks in there and was NOT amused by the little pip squeak. Mostly they (young roosters) wait until they are more mature.

Keep an eye on the situation as it unfolds and they grow up and be prepared to remove one or both of the young ones if/when things get too wild out there. The addition of the new pullets should hopefully help matters though. Best of luck!

 

[Harmony Fowl]

I have an adult rooster and reared several younger birds until I decided which one to keep, so now I have an older one and a younger one, about six months old. And there are always a few young cockerels around. I don't process them until at least 16 weeks and I've not had any problems with the adult picking on them. They're much more likely to fight among themselves. BUT I think a lot has to do with the personality of the adult(s). Our rooster will come running over at the sound of conflict, but he doesn't actually intervene forcefully, he just stands there and tries to pressure the others to break it up. If your adults live with one another peacefully, I think there's a good chance they won't be bothered by the youngsters while they're still small. By 16 weeks, the boys are a pretty good size and by then male behaviors have typically started. I wouldn't expect to see any bullying until then. I've observed that birds, male and female, that grow up in a varied flock often deal with one another better than those who have grown up with only peers and no seniors or juniors to themselves. I have six now at 9-10 weeks, five of them boys, of course, and everyone still treats them as just chicks. They will probably pose a problem for your hens before they pose a problem for one another.

 

[Shadrach]

I've found father and son works better than brothers and strangers.
The sons will challenge the senior rooster (father) but once again in my experience these are short conflicts, the son checking that the senior rooster is up to the job of being boss.
I would guess, if you're going to have problems, it will be between the brothers.
The hens assuming they are mature will handle the cockerels until their fully grown as Sumi puts it, they'll beat the tar out of them.
Once they mature,then keeping order will fall to the senior rooster.
I've got eight rooters here at the moment and they're not killing each other.

 

[arrowti]

Thanks for the thoughts!

The father is not actually the king rooster, the bantam is. They get along quite well though. The bantam will chase him around from time to time. I'm not sure how the bantam got on top but he is.

The two brothers do fight a lot with each other. I'm keeping the better behaved brother, and by that I mean the one who isn't isn't mean to the even younger chicks we have. The other brother actually pecks his mother and the younger chicks. (The mother stopped raising the chicks weeks ago, but she still calls them over sometimes for treats and she's never gone after them).

 

[Shadrach]

Thanks for the thoughts!

The father is not actually the king rooster, the bantam is. They get along quite well though. The bantam will chase him around from time to time. I'm not sure how the bantam got on top but he is.

The two brothers do fight a lot with each other. I'm keeping the better behaved brother, and by that I mean the one who isn't isn't mean to the even younger chicks we have. The other brother actually pecks his mother and the younger chicks. (The mother stopped raising the chicks weeks ago, but she still calls them over sometimes for treats and she's never gone after them).

There's something about mothers and sons in the chicken world but probably best not to go there