# How to pick which Rooster to keep?



## Artisan Acres (Apr 4, 2020)

I hatched out chicks earlier this year and now have the tough decision of picking out which rooster to keep. I did this a couple years ago and decided to keep the prettiest and friendliest. The one I could always pick up and hold. Turns out, he became a monster. He could see me from across the way, and run for me to attack. He snuck up on me a couple of times and attacked me from behind. Then when family was over, he attacked my sister and tried to get my fast nephew. He would jump our fence to the back yard to come and attack us. I never did anything mean towards him. Just one day, something at have snapped. I was in their run filling up water like normal and he got me from behind. And it continued like that forever. He is not a problem anymore, but he sure was beautiful. No we have 8 to choose from. Any tips or advice? Do I need to lay down the law somehow to keep my new rooster from turning on me?


----------



## Jessica84 (Oct 27, 2011)

Every friendly rooster I have had turned out to be mean. So I would pick the most stand offish one you have. We have tried everything to get them to knock it off, since it’s always the chick my daughter picks that ends up being a rooster, but they still end up not living here any more


----------



## Rancho Draco (Sep 29, 2021)

It has been my experience that the more of a pet that you make out of a rooster, the worse they are when they hit puberty. Pick one that keeps his distance from you. I have never been able to "fix" a rooster that was babied as a chick.


----------



## DDFN (Jul 31, 2011)

We normally kept ducks instead but growing up my uncle always kept chickens. He only kept one sweet rooster that stayed sweet. All the others over the years were the ones that would stay off by themselves and mind their own business. If any got out of line or two hard to handle they went on the grill and replaced. I preferred ducks because they were so much more gentle and had bigger eggs . Much harder on water if they don't have a pond but drakes are much easier to deal with than roosters.


----------



## Rancho Draco (Sep 29, 2021)

Just my experience, but I found ducks to be much harder. They overall were jerks to my chickens when they were growing up and found it great fun to pull chickens down off the low roosts. They would also chase my chickens and pull feathers for fun. When they got older, my drake started picking fights with my chickens and actually killed my rooster so I shot all the ducks. They ate more, were way messier, dug holes all over the yard, and they never shut up. They were also really stupid which made the experience so much more infuriating.


----------



## littleheathens (Apr 27, 2019)

Rancho Draco said:


> Just my experience, but I found ducks to be much harder. They overall were jerks to my chickens when they were growing up and found it great fun to pull chickens down off the low roosts. They would also chase my chickens and pull feathers for fun. When they got older, my drake started picking fights with my chickens and actually killed my rooster so I shot all the ducks. They ate more, were way messier, dug holes all over the yard, and they never shut up. They were also really stupid which made the experience so much more infuriating.


What breed was this? It sounds horrible! (And funny). It's not the typical narrative for ducks. 

Regardless, on the OP's question regarding rooster selection...many intact males of many species can/will get mean, usually around 2 years. I've never had a severely mean rooster, like you describe, but we don't treat any of our chickens like pets. When they see you as friend, they also see you as part of the flock, and are establishing dominance. Do not let them win. You can break the mean streak by catching them and restraining/holding them until they calm. Do that over and over and they usually subdue. Kill em' with kindness. Or soup pot.


----------



## double j (Aug 16, 2021)

Artisan Acres said:


> I hatched out chicks earlier this year and now have the tough decision of picking out which rooster to keep. I did this a couple years ago and decided to keep the prettiest and friendliest. The one I could always pick up and hold. Turns out, he became a monster. He could see me from across the way, and run for me to attack. He snuck up on me a couple of times and attacked me from behind. Then when family was over, he attacked my sister and tried to get my fast nephew. He would jump our fence to the back yard to come and attack us. I never did anything mean towards him. Just one day, something at have snapped. I was in their run filling up water like normal and he got me from behind. And it continued like that forever. He is not a problem anymore, but he sure was beautiful. No we have 8 to choose from. Any tips or advice? Do I need to lay down the law somehow to keep my new rooster from turning on me?


I have raised and hatched chicken's for about 10 years now. There is no "perfect rooster". I keep about 10 roosters that run together with the girls. You have to lay the law down quickly with them. If they try to jump on you, catch the rooster and lay him on his back with you standing over him for a few minutes. When you let him go he may try to jump again. Keep repeating this til he runs when you let him go. With chicken's it's all about pecking order and you need him to know you rule the roost. Hope this helps.


----------



## Artisan Acres (Apr 4, 2020)

Jessica84 said:


> Every friendly rooster I have had turned out to be mean. So I would pick the most stand offish one you have. We have tried everything to get them to knock it off, since it’s always the chick my daughter picks that ends up being a rooster, but they still end up not living here any more


I might just try this method this time. Thanks!


----------



## Tanya (Mar 31, 2020)

You have to be head rooster with them. Especially if you are only keeping one


----------



## littleheathens (Apr 27, 2019)

Yes- choose one that is not pet-like.


----------



## DDFN (Jul 31, 2011)

I would not recommend mixing ducks and chickens as the drakes would still try to breed the chickens/hens. But I never kept ducks and chickens together,  I had ducks and my uncle had chickens separate farms. Any rooster that gave him issues we ate.


----------



## Tanya (Mar 31, 2020)

My great grand aunt, on my moms side, had this big red rooster. His name was Ben. Aptly named after the bull we had for lunch on that particular day. You see Ben hated men. And if she was in the vicinity he hated them more but she could cuddle him and all.
That day, when bog Ben had been consumed my mom and dad went for a walk to discuss wedding plans.
When they returned my dad carried Ben by the neck, sporting about 60 scratches on hos face. He said itvwas an accident. My mom said it was self defence. 😁


----------



## Rancho Draco (Sep 29, 2021)

littleheathens said:


> What breed was this? It sounds horrible! (And funny). It's not the typical narrative for ducks


One of the hens was an Appleyard, the rest were mixed breeds.



DDFN said:


> I would not recommend mixing ducks and chickens as the drakes would still try to breed the chickens/hens.


My ducks kept well enough away from the chickens until my drake killed my rooster. After that he would chase down the hens and try to breed them. Regardless, my experience mixing the two was horrible but I don't think I would have liked ducks any more had I raised them separate. When the chickens had all gone to roost (my ducks stayed out way later than the chickens) the ducks would pull the same crap with each other as they did with the chickens.


----------



## DDFN (Jul 31, 2011)

Rancho Draco said:


> One of the hens was an Appleyard, the rest were mixed breeds.
> 
> 
> My ducks kept well enough away from the chickens until my drake killed my rooster. After that he would chase down the hens and try to breed them. Regardless, my experience mixing the two was horrible but I don't think I would have liked ducks any more had I raised them separate. When the chickens had all gone to roost (my ducks stayed out way later than the chickens) the ducks would pull the same crap with each other as they did with the chickens.


The drake to female ratio needs to be greater numbers for him to rotate through. Yes they will breed to fertile the eggs but that's their job. I never had a problem and commonly had 3 drakes to my big collection of ducks. Ran pekin, runners and golden 300. The runners did not handle the environment well but the Pekins and golden 300 did very well at the farm, but never had a chicken on the property. We had a pond on the back side of the farm and a kiddie pool on the front side for them.

My uncle and cousins little boy swear by their chickens but always remember having issues with overly protective hens collecting eggs at their place when I was a kiddo. Ducks could care less they wanted attention and water that was it.


----------



## Rancho Draco (Sep 29, 2021)

DDFN said:


> The drake to female ratio needs to be greater numbers for him to rotate through. Yes they will breed to fertile the eggs but that's their job. I never had a problem and commonly had 3 drakes to my big collection of ducks. Ran pekin, runners and golden 300. The runners did not handle the environment well but the Pekins and golden 300 did very well at the farm, but never had a chicken on the property. We had a pond on the back side of the farm and a kiddie pool on the front side for them.
> 
> My uncle and cousins little boy swear by their chickens but always remember having issues with overly protective hens collecting eggs at their place when I was a kiddo. Ducks could care less they wanted attention and water that was it.


I had 5 ducks and 1 drake and they did fine together. I never incubated eggs and none of the ducks went broody so I don't know if they were fertile. My drake decided he was bored of his ducks so he killed my rooster so that he could chase the chickens.


----------



## Jubillee (Dec 22, 2017)

We currently have 4 roosters out there, 3 are going in the freezer when we butcher our cornish next week. We have never had a mean rooster in the 6 years we've had chickens. We don't baby ours and lately, since they'd been free-ranging more and we are more hands off, they all almost act feral. We had to pen them up again and are about to move them to a new coop, 2-3 of those hens are nutzo. 

But no roosters have chased us, they mind their own business thankfully. We're just butchering the others because I'm not feeding extra roosters and no egg return.


----------



## BrookviewFarm (Apr 8, 2021)

Rancho Draco said:


> It has been my experience that the more of a pet that you make out of a rooster, the worse they are when they hit puberty. Pick one that keeps his distance from you. I have never been able to "fix" a rooster that was babied as a chick.



I fix all those roosters! its easy! behead then fresh chicken breast dinner!


----------



## Artisan Acres (Apr 4, 2020)

Jubillee said:


> We currently have 4 roosters out there, 3 are going in the freezer when we butcher our cornish next week. We have never had a mean rooster in the 6 years we've had chickens. We don't baby ours and lately, since they'd been free-ranging more and we are more hands off, they all almost act feral. We had to pen them up again and are about to move them to a new coop, 2-3 of those hens are nutzo.
> 
> But no roosters have chased us, they mind their own business thankfully. We're just butchering the others because I'm not feeding extra roosters and no egg return.


We also free range (they usually only travel a 2 acre area, mainly in the woods) and was hoping that rooster would be busy enough watching his hens then to worry about me. When they are far away, no problem. But if I happened to walk towsrds the area they were free ranging, he’d be worried about attacking me. If they were making their way back towards the coop in the evening, he’d come looking for me. My husband would laugh as he’d watch the rooster spot me and make he’s way towards me as fast as possible from 100 yards away. I raised them all from chicks, fed and watered them, gave them treats...tried being authoritative when he started acting off, but he was just psycho, lol. Hoping for a better shot this time by not using a sweet, snuggly rooster!


----------



## Artisan Acres (Apr 4, 2020)

BrookviewFarm said:


> I fix all those roosters! its easy! behead then fresh chicken breast dinner!


Lol! Yep, always my go to. But now I have a closed flock and am trying to keep my breeding lines pretty clean without purchasing more roosters. (Raising Speckled Sussex, hard to find replacements without ordering chicks where I live) That’s why I am hoping for a winner winner that won’t be chicken dinner this time! 😂


----------



## BrookviewFarm (Apr 8, 2021)

Lol


----------



## Cedarwinds Farm (Dec 2, 2019)

It might be nice for your hens to pick one that isn't too aggressive to them.  Some roosters are pretty easy going with the hens, others, not so much.


----------



## Rancho Draco (Sep 29, 2021)

BrookviewFarm said:


> I fix all those roosters! its easy! behead then fresh chicken breast dinner!


That has been my approach as well😉


----------



## BrookviewFarm (Apr 8, 2021)

FWIW I have had several friendly roosters through the years. only a couple of bad ones. right now i have one that attacks me a little bastard, i mean bantam but his days are numbered.


----------



## alwaystj9 (Apr 10, 2019)

I couldn't figure out how to link this so I copied it: How to Select a Good Flock Rooster from Backyard Chickens.com









When selecting roosters for your flock, many people only consider the breed or the confirmation of the bird (when selecting for the Standard Of Perfection). However, a rooster can be the breed that you want or meet every checkpoint on the SOP but still be a very bad flock rooster. Here is a list of things I look for when selecting which of my roosters to keep. Some people may choose to loosen their requirements, but these are the ones I follow to get the roosters that are satisfactory.

*Note:* I will be using some variant of the term "removed from the flock" when speaking about what I do with roosters that do not meet my standards. What this constitutes can mean different things to different people. For me, it means culling the bird to eat. For others, who don't want to eat a bird they’ve cared for, it may mean re-homing, selling, or giving the bird his own individual housing. I can't tell you what removing a rooster from your flock will look like for you, but it is important for the safety of any people that interact with your flock, your hens, your chicks, and your other cockerels/roosters that you find a way to deal with any bad roosters that may come into your possession.

*Is he tolerant of people, adults, and kids?*

This is the MOST important issue for me. The reason is that I mostly have large fowl birds of very large breeds (mostly Cornish) and a 10-15 lb rooster flying at an adult can be dangerous. It is even more dangerous for children because their faces are lower and can be easily spurred. I have young children. I want my children to be involved in chicken keeping and not to have to worry about being attacked while they are working with us or out spending time with the flock.

Ideally, for me, the best roosters are wary of people without being aggressive. For example, one of my former flock roosters, Molasses, would stand back and watch any people near his flock. He actually kept a closer eye on my toddler than he did adults. However, he never offered any aggression to people, even when he was handled. He would flap and squawk and sometimes accidentally scratch while trying to get away while being handled, but he never bit, pecked, or flogged us when being handled. When his hens were being handled (which meant a lot of squawking), he would often run up to investigate but would back off when he saw a person was the cause of the disruption.

I would still have him as the main flock rooster, however, I didn't want to breed Cochins anymore and I sold him to a lovely lady that was buying his hens.



For me, any of the following actions towards people, get a rooster removed from my flock:

Pecking a person
Flogging a person
Chasing a person
Offering to fight a person like they are another rooster
Displays of dominance over a person
In short, I expect all my roosters to give ground to people and not offer any confrontations.

*Note:* I know not everyone will agree with or want to be this stringent about their rooster's behavior where people are concerned. I do believe rehabilitation is possible for more minor offenders. However, with my family's make-up, I can't risk keeping any rooster that displays any of the behaviors above. For folks who want to try retraining their roosters, *Beekissed's Rooster Speak* is the best resource I've seen on the topic. I've used some of the techniques mentioned in the original post with my own roosters to good effect, but I realized I can't depend on a child to project the same confidence and dominance in order to be safe. I intend to teach my kids how to use the tools mentioned in the article, but I will be aiding their learning by only keeping roosters that meet my more stringent criteria.

*Is he nice to and protective of his hens?*

Ideally, a rooster should be attentive, protective, and respectful to his hens and not be overly aggressive while mating. Some problems with mating can happen when you don't have enough hens for your rooster. Most people say you need at least 10 hens per rooster. I find that numbers can often be too low. I prefer at least 15-20 hens per rooster in a flock situation. When it comes to breeding pens, the ratios are often lower, 2-4 hens per rooster, so that you are breeding with your best stock. In a breeding situation, the rooster can always be removed and added back 2 times a week to achieve fertility. However, in a flock situation that is more difficult, especially if the rooster has more than enough hens to meet his needs. Some wear on feathers around the head and saddle area is to be expected, but excessive wear can be a sign of over-breeding or overly aggressive breeding.

 

To determine if the cause is over-breeding or aggressive breeding, you need to watch your flock.

If you have the proper flock ratios, you can remedy over-breeding by giving the affected girls hen saddles to protect their backs, trimming your rooster's spurs, or housing your rooster(s) separately from your hens part of the time.

In an aggressive breeding scenario, it will be obvious that the rooster is actively hurting a hen when he is mating her. Often, hens will not squat for a rooster that is aggressive with them, so he will use force. This can also be seen in younger roosters who are learning the proper way of things, but sometimes with mature girls should whip him into shape and teach him some manners. A truly aggressive breeder, will not relent or learn as he gets older (9 months for fast-maturing breeds, 12 for slower maturing breeds, or a month after being added to a flock if they are older). If you've remedied the ratios, tried using older girls to school him, and protected your girls with saddles and spur trimmings and he is still managing to hurt some of your hens, he should be removed from your flock.

Another factor you want to look at is, how does he treat your hens when food is involved. A good, caring rooster will make this soft clucking noise when they find anything that may be appetizing to call his hens to eat and he will drop bits of the food in front of them. This behavior is called "tidbitting". He will also allow them to eat first. Some good roosters will eat as well, but they will alternate between watching for threats, eating, and tidbitting. A not-so-good rooster will try to bolt down as much food as he can while it is there without calling his hens to the feast. A BAD rooster will actively interfere with the hens while they are eating to try to get more food for themselves. This is what the first rooster did. General Tso was a beautiful Dominique/RIR rooster. However, when it came to the food he was vicious. If the hens got to the feed first he would run up, jump on top of the hen closest to him, and actively shove her away from the food bowl. Once the food was gone from that section of the bowl, he would then start bullying the other hens away from the rest of the food. This is not the behavior you want to see in your flock rooster and was one of the many reasons General Tso was removed from my flock.











Another thing you need to watch for is a rooster that is an outright bully to your hens. If you have any rooster that beats up on hens for ANY reason, he needs to be removed from your flock. I'm not talking about little sparring matches with dominant hens to decide the flock hierarchy. These rarely get out of hand and usually only end up with minor injuries to the comb or wattles, if any injury is apparent. I'm talking about knock-down, drag-out fights that leave your hen bleeding and running away and the rooster pursues after the hen gives up. That is NOT okay and should not be tolerated.

*Is he nice to and protective of chicks?*

When selecting a flock rooster, I prefer to have a rooster that will care for chicks almost as much as a broody hen will. This includes tidbitting for the chicks, shepherding them around, gently schooling them when they get out of line, and protecting them from predators and overly aggressive hens. Molasses, my Black Cochin, was one such rooster. He loved little chicks and was always very good with younger birds. When he was 4-5 months old Molasses was bullied so badly by the head flock rooster I had at the time, that he nearly starved to death. So we decided to move him in with my flock of Delaware and New Hampshire chicks. When we added him to their pen, the New Hampshire cockerel chick with the biggest comb immediately challenged him to a battle. When the chick attacked him, Molasses gave him one swift kick and a peck on the head. The chick ran away, squawking in distress and Molasses let him be. He was really good with these chicks and could be seen sheltering them under his wings or letting them snuggle up to him. Later, when I let my second broody raise her chicks with the flock, he was almost a secondary mom to the babies. He even protected them from the sassiest Delaware and New Hampshire hens that grew up with him.

 

At the very least, a flock rooster should leave any chicks alone.

Excessively pecking, harassing, throwing, or mauling chicks is not acceptable behavior and is cause for removing him from the flock.

*Is he tolerant of other roosters?*

The reason I use the term "tolerant" of other roosters is that even the best flock rooster doesn't necessarily like sharing his ladies with another man. While you may occasionally have a situation where you get "best buddy" roosters in your flock, you shouldn't necessarily expect this to be the norm. When you want to introduce a new rooster into a flock, you can do it one of two ways. The easiest transition is to introduce the new "rooster" when he is still a young cockerel that hasn't reached sexual maturity yet (14 weeks or less) and allow the alpha rooster and the cockerel to slowly figure out the hierarchy as the cockerel matures. The other way, with a sexually mature cockerel/rooster, is to do a "see, no touch" introduction for a week or two and then let him in with the flock while you are there to supervise. In either case, there may be some "cockfighting" to try to determine the pecking order. This is completely normal and should be expected. What should happen, after no more than 10 min of fighting, one rooster/cockerel should give in and retreat. A little bit of chasing by the winning rooster/cockerel should be expected. However, what is NOT acceptable is for the winner to chase down the loser and continue to flog him. Another thing that is not acceptable, is for the winner to flog the loser every time he sees him. This is what happened to Molasses before I moved him into the pen with the chicks. I added him and the Buff Orpington chicks he was raised within with my main flock. Alfredo, my flock rooster at the time, a leghorn mutt, did not like any of the cockerels. He made it his mission to hunt them down any time he saw them. There were 16 Buff cockerels and Molasses. The Buff cockerels were faster than Alfredo and, with so many of them, it was hard for Alfredo to corner any single one of them. Molasses, being a LF Cochin, was slower and easier to pick out of the crowd. Every time Alfredo saw Molasses, he would chase him down and flog him until Molasses retreated into the coop. He also didn't allow Molasses to come out and eat at feeding time.











If you are only going to keep one rooster, this may not be much of a problem. Alfredo fit all my other criteria, except that he wasn’t a purebred of a breed I wanted to continue breeding, and if I was only going to keep a few hens and rooster for protection, this wouldn't have been an issue. However, at a later point, he pinned down another rooster and almost flogged him to death. This led me to remove him from my flock because I need to keep multiple roosters to achieve my goals.

Updated note: I've changed my thinking on this a little bit since I initially wrote this article. I'm currently working with Heritage Cornish meat birds. The birds are fine when they grow up and stay together but when I separate them for breeding purposes I can't put them back together without them injuring each other (joint injuries from trying to fight and falling to the ground). Their body confirmation doesn't allow them to be as resilient as other breeds after having a minor cockfight. Even the hens have a tendency to fight when groups are mixed back together if they aren't kept in view of the other hens. I am mainly concerned with non-aggression towards humans over the rooster aggression issue. I will probably be keeping the breeding roosters separate from other roosters in the future.

*In conclusion*

There is always a way to find a good rooster, and there is never a reason to put up with a bad flock rooster. Even if he is the best-looking specimen of the breed you've ever seen, you do not want to breed him and risk his offspring having the same temperament or worse. I find that offspring from even-tempered hens and roosters generally have a similar disposition as their parents. You don't want to breed any aggression forward.

Don't ever think you have to put up with a bad flock rooster.


----------



## Mike at Capra Vista (Nov 30, 2017)

I had the opposite problem with my last rooster (Roo). Whenever I approached, he would tell the hens that I was coming to rip off their wings or some such thing and they would stay as far away from me as possible in their run. Sometimes they would even panic and try to fly through the fencing and I worried about injury. Roo was hen hatched and raised here and was eat-out-of-your-hand friendly. His change in behavior (and that of the hens) started the day after he took over the hens from his father last winter. I came out in the morning to find Roo and his brother beating up their father who by the time I got there was almost dead. The coop and run looked like a horror show. After removing (read butchering) the father, Roo went after his brother. Great, more blood and another chicken in the freezer. Roo didn't have a scratch on him after all that fighting. I was worried he was going to be a problem. I had heard about some roosters attacking people and I didn't want any part of that. So, his sudden fear of me came as a surprise.

I sold Roo last week and since then none of the hens are afraid of me. Other than the fear of me I think he was a good rooster to the hens, though I have not yet done any exit interviews with the hens. When free ranging, he would always run around to see where the hens were. He would come running if one of the hens squawked. He would warn the hens of any large bird overhead.

Now, I too have to decide which of my young roosters to keep. Of my 6 hatchlings, 5 are roosterlets.


----------



## alwaystj9 (Apr 10, 2019)

I totally feel the rooster picking pain. I finally had a super great roo, got rid of all the rest...then Super-great-roo was murdered by a hawk...
Starting the roo-pick all over again.


----------



## Mike at Capra Vista (Nov 30, 2017)

I try to go with "the heir and a spare" philosophy. Keep the rooster I want and keep the runner up in case the first choice does not survive. That is until the two cannot live together anymore.


----------

