Wednesday, December 31, 2008

Roosters - Good or Bad?


Well that's a very good question. That depends on what you want to do with your chickens. Are you keeping hens for eggs and meat or do you want to breed as well.

These are the things you should consider before you look into getting a rooster
  • Roosters are territorial and will attack both adults and children alike (I'm talking from experience here)
  • Roosters don't have set hours for crowing. If there is more than one rooster then they will have crowing competitions. Not good at 3 am in the morning when you want to get some sleep!
  • Hens kept for laying will have no peace from a rooster wanting to do his duty. The hens end up ragged and can cease laying.
  • More than one rooster can end up with constant fights and badly injured birds if kept together
  • If breeding a rooster will be happy if he has at least four hens. The rooster should be in with his hens for a minimum of ten days.
  • Don't let the rooster free range outside of his area. Better to give your rooster a nice sized area where he can pick for bugs and grubs and stay healthy rather than being confined in a small cage or run.
My advice is if you're only keeping hens for eggs and for the pot then don't get a rooster. If a hen goes broody then get some fertile eggs instead and put those under the hen to hatch. Saves having the trouble of getting a rooster in especially to get the eggs fertile. If you're breeding make sure the rooster you get has nice bright eyes, comb and wattles. His feathers should be shiny and healthy looking. Wings shouldn't droop and the legs should be clean and free of any parasites and diseases. A rooster with a dull comb, drooping wings and dull feathers should be pointedly avoided. He won't be healthy enough to breed from. Give the rooster clean housing and a nice good sized area where he can roam outside and scratch and pick to his hearts content.

Tuesday, December 23, 2008

Do chickens get worms?

Do chickens get worms? The answer to that question is yes chickens can and do get worms. Ever wondered why your favourite hen or rooster suddenly gets sick, loses weight then one morning you find them sadly having departed from the world. The answer to that is most likely the cause has been worms. We found that out here on our farm a couple of years ago when my middle daughter Inaya's pet chicken Maggie May suddenly became less than well, hardly eating and the weight on her had dropped off rapidly. Worse still she had the runs. One very sick little Black Astralorp hen was taken to the vets. Sounds crazy, but not just being any old chicken No was not an answer. I wrote a story for the Rural Living titled No Poultry Emotion. One very expensive lesson and I seriously should have known way better having bred birds for years chickens too needed to be wormed. You can get a product called Aviderm from your local vet centre the cost is under $25 and will last a while. Birds should be wormed every three months. A withholding period of ten days is advised before consuming any of the eggs the hens may have laid. Worth the wait to have healthy birds and no deaths from an infestation of worms. I'll putting in resources into the side bar of this blog if there are any queries on these sort of problems.