Why would you keep the rooster? The general feeling from most chicken keepers seems to be just the opposite. Rightly so in the case of neighborhood rules, or possibly having small children around. But in many cases, if you keep the rooster, your flock will benefit from a good leader.
When you picked up your chicks this year, the little fluffy balls of fun were so cute! No doubt one was your favorite. Now that the chicks are reaching 10 to 12 weeks of age, you have begun to notice something a little different about your favorite chick. It may be slightly bigger, stand a little taller, have bigger feet and it may be growing a slightly more noticeable comb or wattles. You may have a rooster! But will you keep the rooster?
Sexing Chicks is Rarely 100% Correct
Before you get upset and jump to possibilities and options, lets explore some reasons why you might want to keep the rooster. If you can legally keep the rooster in your neighborhood or town, there are some good reasons to have one around. You may have heard that a rooster is mean, ornery, and dangerous. These reasons can be true but they are not always the case. (Read more about Cranky Roosters in this post.) I am not advocating keeping an overly aggressive rooster.
I find the roosters are a great addition to our flock. We currently have fourteen roosters. Before you make a move to have my sanity checked, let me tell you that we generally do keep quite a few roosters. They work hard every day, keeping the hens safe. Let me explain a few reasons that I am glad we keep the rooster.
The Rooster as a Peacekeeper
Peacekeeper – The rooster in a flock is in charge. He will assume this role and do what he has to do to maintain his position. Other roosters may be able to be part of the flock, too, as long as they don’t challenge him. In addition, the rooster will keep the hens from squabbling among themselves. In the absence of a rooster, a hen will often take the role of flock leader.
Keep the Rooster for Flock Protection
Protection – Roosters are on alert most of the day, watching for predators, alerting the hens, and making sure they take cover. While the hens are dust bathing or eating, the rooster will stand guard and stay alert to possible danger. When a hawk or some other predator is spotted, the rooster will sound the alarm. He is calling the hens back to safety. If they free range, this might be a bush to hide under, or the nearby coop. In our case, with multiple roosters, the alarm is picked up and the other roosters begin to gather their hens too. It’s quite amazing to witness.
The Rooster will Provide
Providing – The rooster will search out tasty food bits and call the hens over to enjoy the snack. He makes sure that his hens get started eating first in the morning and then he begins to eat too. In addition, roosters provide the necessary actions for having fertile eggs, in case you want to hatch out eggs in an incubator or let a broody hen set on a clutch of eggs.
The Crowing?
Crowing–  Now I am sure you are wondering how I can put a positive light on this noisy ear splitting wake up call. First, roosters don’t necessarily start crowing before  dawn. Ours will often stay quiet until they hear me in the feed shed, dishing up breakfast. Roosters crow to warn other roosters to stay away. They also crow to celebrate, such as when breakfast arrives, after mating, or to show pecking order. In addition, they will crow to let the hens know the location of the flock, when it’s time to head back to the coop at night and various other reasons. But the best reason, for flock security, would be the crowing to warn of an approaching visitor.
While you may decide to re -home your cockerel and just keep the pullets, I am very glad I kept one particular oops rooster. Even though I ordered all pullets, we received a rooster in the bunch. He is a white rock cockerel who we named King. For years, King was the star of our poultry area. He may have jumped at me once or twice in his younger, impulsive days. I quickly put a stop to that and he grew into a wonderful protector.
I see benefits and uses when you keep the rooster. Let me know how your surprise roosters turn out.
Some great points, a friend of mine has a rooster (she inherited it when she purchased her place – the previous owners took the hens and left the rooster), he’s a handsome devil and I’ve never seen any aggression from him. She ended up having to get a couple of hens for him so he would stop trying to make friends with the dogs.
Thanks for sharing.
I really think I would feel something was missing if we did not have roosters Thanks so much for stopping by
We would not be without a Rooster! We love our’s and as far as the crowing, it reminds me of how lucky we are to live in the country 🙂
I agree with you!
The roosters are so beautiful! We have kept three. Although they get noisy, they are worth keeping!
Great post! I’m pinning and sharing on FB, Twit….
I love your chicken posts!
Lisa
Lisa, thank you! I consider that a huge compliment as I often look to your site for information. Thanks Much!
Has there been a “quiet rooster” created yet? We have to get rid of our White Leghorn a few months ago because he was too loud and I was afraid the neighbors would complain. But next to our German Shepherd, he was my favorite animal on our place.
No, but there are these velcro straps that gently constrict the roosters esophagus without ristricting air flow. It males the crow quiet or turns it into a coughing noise and does not hurt the bird. I have not tried it uet but i am getting a roo in a few days who i will try this on. Find me on youtube at The Trailhead Homestead where ill post a vid on my setup and results.
And the #1 reason to have roosters is They are tastie!
That can be a benefit in many cases. I try to respect the people who just can’t bring themselves to eat their egg laying pets But yes many people do use surplus roos for dinner
I have two roosters Barney and Cocky Locky. Barney has a flock of Wyandottes, a Maran, and a Russian Orloff, CL has five Amercaunas. I have a younger flock that doesn’t yet have a rooster. The boys free range their girls around our three acres and get along just fine.
Sounds like a beautiful setting! I can picture it! I had so much fun talking chickens with Kat and Rich Thanks for being there. I will email the winner tomorrow night. – Janet
I love, love, love the roosters! I only have one now?Napoleon?and he is wonderful to have around. He spies hawks and owls before the dog does, he rushes around taking care of all the ladies, and he is a daddy now since my broody hatched their egg. He is a loud guy, so he sleeps in his own special mini-coop in the garage to keep his 4:30am crows mostly unheard by the neighbors!
I love hearing from other readers who enjoy having a rooster as part of the chicken family. thanks so much for sharing Joan
i purchased two polish chickens which I was assured were hens, and we named them Sophie and Luna but as they grew we realized they were both roosters. We had 6 hens already. We kept them of course since we became very attached and they were both friendly. Now the bigger one has taken control of the girls and keeps the smaller guy out of the coop at night ( we found him up on the roof a few nights ago) we have ordered so new hens and when they are old enough to free range with the rest we hope Luna ( the small one) will have his own flock. How can we be sure Luna will adopt the new girls as his. Yes we kept their names Luna and Sophie.
I love the names! Here’s what I would do. As the babies are growing I would let Luna in with them from time to time while you are watching carefully. As they grow, continue to gradually introduce the pullets to Luna. There shouldn’t be a problem with him adopting his new harem of ladies. Good luck!
We have a rooster, Big Papi. He has a melodious voice that he uses judiciously, but share food? No way! He chases the girls away from the best bits, so we have to fling their treats widely enough that he can’t monopolize them. He’s a Deli Roll – half Delaware, half Faverolle – and a gorgeous boy.
He sounds like a lot of fun!
I had 5 roosters at one time. all but one is left due to predators. (This is time span of 2 years or more) they are great at protecting the flock. I had one rooster that was horrible then straighten out when we received some more roosters .(So some can be mean).
I had one that was my fav. who was a sweetheart and beautiful but died protecting the girls.
I would always have a least one rooster around because of that.
One of my Americauna hens ended up being a He. I kept him and really enjoy watching him with the girls. It’s been a little over a year. Unfortunately it’s time to re home him as he has become aggressive toward my 2 small dogs as he sees them as a threat. He is going to a new home not far from me with 14 hens. I’m going to miss him.
We have 2 Easter Eggers roosters that share the responsibilities of their 12 girls. Our white one is the protector, always on alert for hawks. And our red is the one searching out tidbits. They both breed different hens. (And we have 5 or 6 more girls to soon add) #6 is larger and has been since hatching, so….
We decided to pick up 2 of the white crested/black Polish chicks this year along with 5 other varieties – we have 11 other adult chickens. The hatchery warned us that it was a 50/50 chance on the sex and sure enough, both appear to be male. One for sure because he’s crowing, but I’m not certain of the other. Our previous experience with roosters was one dominant that crowed and the other didn’t bother, so I don’t know if that’s the case here as well. We don’t want fertilized eggs, but these guys are so unique that we’re considering keeping them separated from the hens but they’d be able to see one another. Can you give me pro/cons on that please? Thanks!
I’m one of those weird people I guess cuz i love roo’s better than hens. (of course I loved my lil girls too ) but my roo’s always kept me laughing. Which caused me to silly things w/ them that kept my family laughing giggle like I had a leghorn that did the “attack type moves” to strangers but he was spared the frying pan cuz he never made contact. he would fluff up and walk sideways jump up and dwn ect so I would imitate his actions only I couldn’t get fluffy :'( but the strangers and my family would bust up laughing. My son saying oh god moms dancing w/ the roo’s again LMAO but thing bout that rooster soon as I sat dwn he’d crawl up on my lap and lay dwn 🙂 And as far as the crowing… plenty of people in the city live by train tracks and after a short time they hardly ever notice them same goes w/ crowing! When me and my husband bought our 1st farm we didn’t realize there were so many chicken farms in the area or we could of bought local. So anyhow I placed a order for silkies straight run as they said they couldn’t sex silkies. (newborn boys are born w/ dark blk legs girls legs don’t darken up for up to 12 hrs or more) So I figured i’d get a few hens that i could put nonsetting roos on to get girls that set at least 1ce a yr. I wound up w/ 25 silkie roos >:( and they wouldn’t send me any to make up for not getting any hens grrrr but I raised them to the age they started showing their traits/ instincts. I used a bunch of colored zip ties on the legs to sort who was a keeper and who to cull! OMG w/ silkies I had the hardest time of my life trying to find the ones to blk tie (cull) instead of being done in an hour it took me days! They all had a super eye to the sky (for flying predators) they were all gentlemen, they were all talkative and all beautiful! I was talking about it at my factory i worked at and to my surprise I found homes for 15 of them just that night! I wound up keeping five and 5 went in the freezer. Moral of the story I would not have chickens w/out a roo (or 5 LOL)