Category Archives: Roosters

Added a fluffy Silkie rooster to my flock

I love the fluffy Silkies.  I only have four girls and they are probably 2-4 years old but I can’t decide if I want to have more of them or not.  I may buy about 4 more females to breed with my new rooster.

The lady I bought Bernie from raises show Silkies and travels the country getting ribbons for them, I guess so if they are not show quality, you can get them cheap.  I only paid 5 bucks for Bernie.  I asked about buying some of her hens but she said 50 bucks and I said no thank you.  They are just pets for me.

I picked out Bernie among at least 20-25 roosters that were about 7 months old because he was hiding behind the others and acted like he was shy and scared.  He is brown with a lot of other colors mixed in (mostly reddish and blondish).

I brought him home and put him in a yard with the four Silkies and the five Silkie mix hens.  He acted so scared for over a week.  We have had him now for probably 6 weeks and he has fit in perfectly and we actually heard him crow about a week ago.

I wanted to take all the roosters home because the lady we bought him from has over 200 chickens and she said if they don’t sell, she uses them for dog food.  That broke my heart.

Too many roosters

I cannot believe out of six eggs, five turned out to be roosters.
The sad thing is I am having such a difficult time re-homing them.  I listed them on Craigslist for sale and then decided I just need to be rid of them because the five I hatched out six weeks later have two roosters in there, too.

Sadly, after two weeks, no one wants them.  If I were more of a “Homesteader” I could kill them and eat them but that does not appeal to me or my husband.  Actually, we only like the breasts and I hate to see the rest of the meat go to waste.  His sisters live behind us so I guess I could check and see if they like dark meat.  I guess if we were desperate for food, we would eat all of the chicken.

My third hatching of six chicks are still undetermined.  They are Silkie/Cochen rooster mix and they are adorable.  Hopefully, I can have more luck finding homes for Bantam roosters.  Last time I sold Bantam roosters, they were gone in a week.

September 9 Update on Cochen mix chickens.   One of the six died and we couldn’t figure out why but the five remaining chickens appear to be girls.  Woo hoo.  I put their daddy in with them to see if he would try to mate or fight with any.  No fighting.  There is only one chicken that I thought could be a boy since he appears to be a little bigger than the others.  So, I will be keeping them all.

My chicken yard is now at 25 with 3 roosters.

Dogs and chickens running free

We had our first mishap with our chickens this year.  I had too many roosters so I let them run free during the day on our two acres.  Two dogs crawled under our gate and killed four of the five roosters.  We were inside eating breakfast and came out in time to see the dogs but atlas, no help for the roosters.  The one rooster hid under our storage shed and stayed there long after we had picked up all the feathers and buried the four roosters.   We named him Lucky.

We have fixed the gate so nothing can get under it by putting dirt in the area where the tires run and make the indention.  We also took our four foot fencing and wired it with two feet on one side and two on the other and it extends down to the ground.  We attached it with cable ties.

Now, I have four roosters and 17 hens which is much better but I would have liked to either sell or give away the extra roosters.  It was a brutal death for them and three of them were still alive when we found them.  Breaks  my heart.  I am thankful I didn’t let all the chickens run free that day.

Moving those roosters out

I believe I am down to about 64 chickens now and I still have another 14 roosters I am looking to re-home.  Often when people come out for the free roosters, they want to buy my hens which are not for sale.

It is amazing that people are so undependable.  I don’t know why that amazes me.  People say I will be out at 4pm and then when 5pm gets here, I check my email just to make sure they didn’t try to contact me.  No phone call, no email.  How inconsiderate.  I have learned to give my cell number out and say call me first to make sure I am home.  That way I can go about my business and if they don’t show up, it doesn’t bother me.  Just because we are retired, doesn’t mean we don’t have a life.  lol

I am telling you this so if and when you decide to sell or give away chickens, make your plans for your life and don’t sit around waiting for people to show up as they say they will.

 

Finally, a buff-colored Silkie chick

I have been putting the eggs from my buff-colored hens under any hen that is broody and not getting any chicks.  Well, I had one chick hatch out yesterday and I am pretty sure she looks like she will be buff-colored.  It is sometimes hard to tell when they are first hatched out.  I realized a couple days ago that one of the chicks hatched out in April is actually going to be buff-colored, too.  I am thrilled.

Lacy is a white Silkie that I got back in December, along with her week old chick.  Her baby chick stuck by her for months and is now full grown and laying eggs herself.  Lacy B (baby) is her name.

Lacy has gone broody twice since December and hatched out chicks for me.  She still has five more eggs under her but none hatched out today.  I put them under her at various times for about a week so I don’t know if more will hatch or not.  Hope so.

Today, I was moving the chicks around and they were not happy about it.  They were making all kinds of noises and the Light Blue Silkie rooster decided to attack me.  He jumped at my legs.  I had on shorts so I got a slight scratch on my leg.  That was the first time I have ever seen any aggression from the roosters.  The momma’s get very aggravated when I try to look under them to see if the eggs have hatched or if I come near their newly hatched chicks but this was a first for me.   Then the Black or Grey Silkie rooster (didn’t really see which one as I had my hands full just trying to carry the three chicks) decided to try to jump me a few minutes later when I was moving more chickens.

I was glad I decided to move the chicks because there were so many ants in the one yard.  The smaller chicks are still eating starter food and they get it everywhere so it has attracted a lot of ants.  Usually before I put chickens in a small yard, I rake it really good to get any old poop out of it.  Sometimes I hose the area down, too.  After it is dry, I sprinkle ant killer granules LIGHTLY in the area.  I make sure there is not any piles of ant granules.  Sometimes I even rake it a little more just so its not so obvious to the chickens.  Then I spread hay on the ground lightly.   This seems to be working for me.  I just make sure there is plenty of food and water for them so they don’t have to start scratching the ground to look for food for awhile.

Well, the chicks are all settled down in their new yards but I still have 7 chicks in my second tub.  They are barely one week old and I don’t want to put them outside yet.   I will get the area that I cleaned out today ready for them in the near future.  Fortunately, the 4×8 cage is moveable so it will be a little less work.

I don’t know how many ant bites I got today.  I am not allergic to the bites but I have noticed that if I get too many at one time, I don’t feel real well.  I bet I got fifteen or twenty today.  Dang it.  I had to trim my trees in my chicken yards, too because every time I went under them or I brushed against one, I ended up with an ant on my blouse or arms.  They must be after me.  I do run around the yard putting ant killer granules out when my chickens are not free ranging so they must have spread the word.  lol

So my count now is 121 chickens.  I really am going to sell some in the near future.  I was out there looking closely at them today, determining hens and roosters.  I know I have two extra black Silkie roosters.  I have the cutest little grey Silkie…I will add a picture tomorrow if I can.  It grey and has white under it’s neck area and it is so fat and fluffy looking.

I was talking to my husband out in the chicken yard commenting on how this one is so cute and how much I like that one.  My husband said, “So which one don’t you like?”  He knew my answer.  NONE.  Though I do get aggravated when one chicken seems to be picking on another one.