So, you want backyard chickens, but you don’t know about the rooster bit. . . so, here’s the deal with roosters:
The pros of having a rooster:
Some of the pros for having a rooster in your flock are:
- You need one if you want to get new chicks every year.
If you want a truly sustainable flock, you have to have at least one. A good rule of thumb for the rooster to hen ratio is that for fertile eggs, you need at least one rooster for every 20 hens. Most backyard flocks are small, since city regulations often limit the number to as little as 6 chickens.
- Roosters will protect your flock from predators.
This may be true out in the country where your chickens have more room to roam, however in the city where your chickens are probably more confined to a small area in your yard, this isn’t so much the case, especially if they are in an enclosed coop at night.
- Fertile eggs are more nutritious and Fertile eggs taste better than infertile eggs.
This is highly debatable, and I have yet to see any conclusive evidence that either of these claims are true.
- Hens lay more eggs when there is a rooster around.
My dad always said that having roosters helped the hens lay more frequently, but I haven’t really noticed a difference without. My hens still lay nearly 1 egg per day in the laying season.
The cons of having a rooster:
- They are aggressive
The degree of aggressiveness depends on the breed, so if you have small children, you would want to consider not having a rooster, or at least having a more docile breed of rooster, but even the more ‘docile’ breeds are more aggressive in the spring and summer because it is breeding season, and even ‘docile’ breeds like the Rhode Island Reds can be very aggressive. The rooster that inspired the name of my blog was a Rhode Island Red.
- They crow
supposedly larger breeds crow less often than the smaller bantam breeds, with a lower pitched crow, but they are also louder. This is a problem if your city has a noise ordinance. You could silence them by having their voice box cut, but to me, that is animal cruelty.
- They eat as much as hens, but don’t lay eggs.
I think that it is ideal to have a rooster, but in the city where your neighbors are apt to complain about the noise, the best use for a rooster is mean rooster soup.