Rooster Troubles

I hatched some heritage Blue Splash Brahma chicks from Carolina Rare chicks line back in February. 

The roosters have started to come in to 'manhood' and Josh has been butchering them a few at a time.  The rooster to hen ratio should be around 8-10 hens per rooster. Right now we have a total of 8 roosters soon to be 6 or 7. So That would be mean we would need 60 hens in order to keep the peace, which we don't have nor really want to have at this moment in time. OH, and I should mention, that these Brahma roosters are massive. Like double the size of an average sized rooster.  In total, we like to keep our numbers for chickens around 40-ish during the winter months.

So back to the Blue Splash Roosters -- this morning Josh went out to open the barn to feed the birds, and found the blue splash Brahma rooster, that we had planned on keeping had broken the neck of a barred rock hen and paralyzed our Barnevlder hen.  It's in a roosters nature to PROTECT the hens, not harm them.  It's hard to say what really happened. I thought maybe he was trying to mate with them and they refused. However, after carefully thinking about the situation, broody hen or not, he shouldn't have harmed them like that. There has to be something wrong with the rooster, so he's gotta go.  It's just not safe for him to stay in our flock any longer. I still plan on breeding them in the Spring but with a different rooster {pending that the last of the blue splash roosters is friendly}

Happier News:

We sold 2 ducks and 3 chicks this week! They went to a home where they will be part of traveling petting zoo. How cool is that?! I'm excited for their adventurous life. It always does the heart good to know they are off to do big things. :) 

 

 

Happy Sunday Y'all!