we bought chicks in mid-novemeber & one turned out to be a roo. my daughter is sad, since it was hers. now her siblings all have chickens & she doesn't. i wondered what you all do when you have roosters. do you take them back to the store? do you get a new chick? do you find someone to take him? i imagine a new chick couldn't survive with the bigger ones, but wondered what other chook owners do.
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well, this morning, our cuckoo marans decided to crow at me, too, so we hauled them off to the store & got 2 new chicks. i was pretty bummed mrs. honeydew turned out to be professor honeydew. i was so looking forward to those dark eggs.
I'm glad they exchanged them for you. Love the name!
Roosters, unfortunately, are hard to place because they're noisy and they aren't social with humans like hens. You can check with the store & they may take it back. I agree with Carrie, you may be best considering the crock pot. If you are able to find a taker, get used to the idea that he may end up in the pot anyway. But he'll still have had a better and longer life than 99% of the roosters hatched, who are doomed as chicks.
As for getting a new chick, you can integrate them with a little effort. I would recommend getting 2 or 3, not just one. That way they have an automatic flock to socialize with until it's part of the other flock. If you decide to do this, post again for ideas on integrating birds & you'll get lots of great information.
Have you considered looking to trade the rooster with someone who has a hen of equal age and breed? I know when we started, that would have been a wonderful trade.
You could give him away, but ours wind up being "Crock-Pot Chickens". The kids know they have a much better life with us than those poor grocery store chickens, they are well fed and treated kindly and peacefully and humanely processed.
i can't wait for him to get big enough to eat since i can't have roosters. i'm also not sure i have it in me to eat one of my own chickens.
I understand, we were at that same place not too long ago. I was so worried about how they would be treated by someone else(knowing what some people will do with roosters) that I felt much better about learning how to process. I know that some feed stores will take roosters and while I have yet to meet a person that would trade a hen for a rooster, maybe someone would be willing to trade a pullet/chick? For future consideration, Gold Sex Links are wonderful birds and can handle our heat pretty well, I would say you could count on getting pullets about 99% of the time. I do have friend who got a Gold Roo this year or I would say 100% of the time :)