Young Rooster Intro

[NorthFlorida]

Good morning, fairly new chicken owner here. Have a flock of lavender Orpingtons, starlight green eggars and a golden laced Wyandotte. I recently got a beautiful 3 month old black Brahma rooster. I’ve had him in a small coop next to the girls for about a month and they seem friendly; however, when I released him to see if he would free range (2 acres) with them, the Wyandotte immediately jumped on him and kicked his butt. He ran and hid under a bush and seems pretty shaken up. From
Reading on here, it sounds like he’s just too young to integrate and needs to wait a few more months. Is there nothing else I should do?

Also, he seems a little lonely in his small coop alone while they free range. They’ll come visit with him a couple times a day but any issues leaving him solo like that for months? I can always get him another Brahma young girlfriend. Thanks in advance!

 

[nuthatched]

Sounds like they're just teaching him the pecking order, your cockerel will be fine, just let them mingle and don't interfere unless you see blood.

 

[Pigeony]

3 months is a fine age to integrate him. In my opinion, if you're introducing a lone teenage rooster and not a full adult, it's better to integrate the cockerel into the flock while he's still young enough that his hormones haven't completely gotten the better of him. He needs to learn that the older hens won't stand for nonsense and will kick his butt if he misbehaves. He's learning the rules of chicken society and it's for the best because he'll grow into a more considerate rooster. A cockerel that just does whatever he wants with no older rooster or hens to correct him can end up being a burden of a bird and a stress on the flock. It's good that you have older hens with a young cockerel, lots of people with same-age pullets and a cockerel that don't have older birds have the issue that their male runs wild, terrorizing/hurting his flock members because the pullets are too timid to put him in his place. Your hens will probably be pretty cruel to him at first, but once the newness is over, they won't be so hard on him and he'll respect their space. Then eventually, he'll work to legitimately win their affections once he's old enough that his interest in mating with them outweighs his fear of them bullying him. I agree with @nuthatched , let them mingle and don't interfere unless someone draws blood.

 

[NorthFlorida]

This is helpful. Thanks for the input. Should I just stick him in the hen house one night and let it go?

 

[Ridgerunner]

Hi, welcome to the forum! Glad you joined! You'll notice we have different experiences, set-ups, goals, flock make-ups, and such so it should not be surprising we have different opinions on things. Growing up, Dad had a free ranging flock that generally had 1 mature rooster and 25 to 30 hens but several chicks were hatched by the hens every year for replacements and meat. When I retired and could keep chickens I set up with 1 rooster and 6 to 8 hens but hatch and raise about 45 chicks every year as replacements and for meat. The eggs are nice too. I play with genetics also so I have a lot of turnover in hens and especially the rooster. Every year I hatch and raise pullets and cockerels with my flock. That's the basic experience I lean on.

I generally have a mature rooster with my flock until I've decided on which of my many cockerels I'll keep as a replacement and have hatched all of the chicks I will hatch that year. Then I have a flock with mature hens and juvenile cockerels.

Until my pullets start to lay I have two separate flocks. If the chicks (male or female) invade the personal space of the hens they are likely to get pecked or attacked. It doesn't take them long to learn to keep a distance. I have over 2,000 square feet outside and a big coop for night so they can avoid the adults. I do not know what facilities you are working with.

My definition of a successful integration is that no one gets hurt. All that one happy flock sleeping together, eating together, and hanging together can wait until they mature enough to get along. Until then, as long as no one gets hurt I'm happy.

When I have cockerels growing up with the flock different things can happen. Sometimes it is pretty peaceful. Not a lot of chasing or fighting. Everybody respects the space of others. This does not happen a lot but does occasionally.

Often the boys chase and force mate the pullets and leave the hens alone. That's not about fertilizing eggs as the girls are not laying. At this age it's about establishing dominance. It can look pretty rough but as long as no one is injured I don't worry about it. Some people get really excited if they see this and start chanting "off with his head". Every three or four years it gets rough enough that I isolate some of the cockerels until butcher age as I don't want any to get hurt. You mentioned possibly bringing in a same aged pullet for him. That might work out OK and it might not.

Sometimes the boys do not leave the mature hens alone. They want to mate them (dominance). The mature hens may let them, no big deal. A lot depends on the individual personality of the cockerel and the hens.

Sometimes the hens do not let them but try to run away. The cockerel may chase them down and force them or may let them run away.

What I often see is that some of the less dominant hens let the cockerel mate but the more dominant do not. Especially the dominant hen. If she sees the cockerel trying to mate a hen she knocks him off. He may run away or stay to fight. One of them wins the fight. This may be what people talk about schooling.

Occasionally a hen will go out of her way to attack and even try to kill a cockerel. They will do the same for pullets but going after cockerels is more common. This may be what people call schooling. I almost never see this but I have a lot of room for them to keep their distance. The tighter your space the more likely I think you would be to see this behavior.

So what do I suggest? My preference would be to wait until your girls are laying and then bring in a mature rooster, 1 to 2 years old. That's usually about as easy an integration as there is. You avoid all these potential teenage issues.

If you are unwilling to give him up (and most people would be) you have a few options. Keep him confined as you are until he is mature enough to sway the hens with his magnificence and grandeur. With most of my cockerels that's around 7 months of age but I've had some not meet that until they are almost a year old. Brahma's can be slow to mature. Try it when you can observe and be ready to separate them again if you need to.

Or you can try letting them roam together now. What I'd expect is that he keeps a certain distance during the day but as a single chick he might want to join the flock. That's where having a buddy could come in handy. They are flock animals and want to be with other animals. That makes integrating a single chick or chicken harder. I start in the morning when they can see to stay away. At night, if your coop is big enough he may be able to keep his distance. When I'm integrating chicks I often find them on the roosts in the morning while the adults are on the coop floor. My roosts are high enough they can avoid the adults.

If you decide to lock him in the coop overnight I suggest you be down there at daybreak as they are waking up to see how it is going. He may be OK or they may have him pinned down and are trying to kill him. When I first lock chicks in the main coop at night I'm down there early until I'm comfortable they will be OK. Most of the time that is just a couple of mornings but I have a big coop with high roosts.

I consider trying to integrate a single immature chick into a flock of older females one of the more risky things to do. But a lot of people do it very successfully, you just have to pay attention. Good luck!

 

[Mrs. K]

A lot depends on your set up. A lot. Space and how that space is set up really influences chicken behavior. I call it bowing to the queen. A juvenile bird, needs a place to get out of sight, a place to give space to the queen.

A lot depends on the way the run is set up. Many runs are just a wide open rectangle, where as every bird can see every other bird 100% of the time, no way to bow to the queen.

Adding clutter, so that a chick that is admonished can bow by getting out of sight. I have seen a chick pecked, run away, and then come right back and eat beside her. But in a wide open run, a chick can't get out of sight, and sometimes an old girl takes offense, and keeps chasing them to make her point.

So I recommend having a lot of clutter in a run. Sawhorses, roosts, pallets up on blocks, pallets leaned against a wall. Mini walls. Inside the coop have some other roosts so that the younger bird can roost in the coop but out of reach of others.

Mostly this will settle if you do nothing. But it does not hurt to interfere if you are uncomfortable. The advice if there is no blood, there is no problem. Take that with a grain of salt, but it is mostly true.

Mrs K