Is my Rooster causing this or is it the hens fighting with each other as they go to roost in the coop. I hear a bunch of squabling type noises every evening when they go to bed, fighting for their favorite roosting bar no doubt. Either that or the dang rooster is getting after them. Had hens and a rooster 20 or so years ago and never saw this. This rooster (you can just see part of him in the pic) is much bigger than the one we had before, and not as nice when he wants some action either. I'd hate to have to get rid of him, as he came as a chick with the girls last spring (2108) and he's rather handsome.

This is probably the worst looking hen, some have hardly any damage, others a smaller area than this one. Someone told me it might be the rooster's spurs causing it when he mounts them.

Any advice?



Geno

First off, it's natural for chickens to squabble over a roosting spot, and they're not going to fight like that, so I'd say it wasn't from that.

Now, I've never seen a rooster do that to a hen, but it's possible I suppose, as they do mount a hen in that fashion, and could do the damage. I'd think that he must be mating with them quite a lot to cause that much damage.

Thanks James,

never saw it before this batch of fowl myself. Next time I'm at the vet's I'll show them the pics too. Maybe there's some sort of "bug" in this area, but I really do think it's the rooster.

He's a randy one for sure.

Geno

Defiantly the rooster.

Might try usi g a pair of times and trim the spur and claws, especially if they stay cooped. If free-ranging, that removes defense.


Or, just make him a democrat. No Interest in hens then!

I know you guys will think this is BS, but....... I had a bunch of chickens, and NO rooster that looked like that. I asked the ol' man what it was, and he told me it was lack of meat. No kidding. So I did what he said. I killed a cottontail and peeled the hide back to expose the meat and hung it in the pen. They peck on it, and leave each other alone. This time of year you gotta change them out often.....grin

I thought it was BS, but after hanging a few rabbits, a couple months go by and they were feathering right out without it ever happening again...

BS!

Feathers are almost all protein.

Interesting.

I do know they'll eat it. Back a coupla months ago I had a friend over to help me clean their yard/coop. In putting in the new straw he saw them get a mouse, might have come from the straw, or it might have been hiding under the coop and got disturbed when we cleaned. And I saw one hen get very interested in a fence lizard that ran thru the fence and back out again.

I'm getting ready to turn them into free rangers next week, so I may hold off having rooster stew for a bit and see if it clears up. They'll likely get more protein running around scratching bugs and critters out from under the sagebrush and junipers. Plenty of voles and field mice out there.

Geno

Chickens peck at red, as in red skin or bloody skin and feathers. They develop a habit and it is contagious among the flock as damage increases.
Some solutions other than dietary, as mentioned above are to make sure that roosting space is more than otherwise thought to be plenty. Then isolate the defeathered hens and isolate the aggressive hens. If necessary to break the habit, the tip of the upper beak can be shortened just enough to disable the ability to produce the sharp pinch.

Yep, IME that’s almost exclusively by hens pecking the cloaca after a tough egg lay.

Yeah, the little research I've done mentions that , but not breaking off feathers.

I'm leaning toward rooster stew..................or a dead rabbit.

Geno

I don't think that word means what you think that word means...



The cloaca is generally found on the other side of the chicken, rooster or hen...

Unless you want to hatch your own chicks, I had no use for a rooster. Never had a problem with my hens mistreating each other. The roosters on the other hand, constantly harassing the hens.

A chicken is not too picky about what it eats, and that includes meat, and all my life I've heard it said that a chicken and a hog will anything. My grandfather raised chickens, hundreds of them, and he pretty much knew everything there was to know about them. I remember him getting rid of hens that wanted to peck on the other hens, and he was very strict on me when it came to me leaving dead critters laying around for the chickens to eat on. I was always shooting blackbirds and just leaving them where they fell, and of course the chickens would eat them.

Chickens eat anything, and are predators of more than bugs.
As kids we would go in the coop and rock the feed box.
Mice would run, and it was like T'ball'ers chasing the ball.
That poor bastard would get stomped, plucked, threw through the air.....
When he was dead, they would fight over him and tear him to pieces.


Time from first appearance to disappearance was maybe 30 seconds.

Are you feeding a higher protein food, or mixing grain.
Like Huntsmans dad, the old remedy was to give them meat scraps.
We never used good meat, just trimmings and left over meat.
If you have a decent balance of supply and birds, give them your table scraps.

I guess the reference wasn’t clear. I was referring to the pecking at red on another chicken, not what Genoa pic shows. I answered that farther up.


But about that red pecking though, I remember back when I sold eggs, there was some research done on a red pince nez type of spectacle installed on chickens’ beaks. Everything was red and they were unable to distinguish red cloacas thereby no pecking.

I have hens that look like that from time to time. Sometimes the roosters are a little over zealous in their affections. I don’t mind having a rooster around because if you’re lucky enough to get a good one they will look over the hens. Also if you have too many roosters and not enough hens, the girls get too much attention. It’s a tricky balance but well worth it!

Good luck!