When do Hens Turn into Roosters?

I know that the blogs have been mostly about chickens but keep in mind that I'm Autistic. We have a tendency to fixate so please be patient. I'm still fixated. It won't last forever since I have ADD also. You just don't get the full effect as I'm not showing you an eighth of what I'm doing. In fact, today I started a new shampoo experiment. On day one I'm already impressed so we shall see how that plays out. Rest assured that soon the posts will be changing subjects frequently as it is time to order garden seeds. The goats will begin kidding in March and I'm on the look out for a buck rabbit to well, you know. I'm going to hatch out a batch of chicks I think in April. Oh, yeah, that's chickens again.

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But though I have parts of other blogs written and some of them are not about chickens, I have something I just have to share. Have you ever heard of a hen that transforms into a rooster?  It got my attention too. We had a goat once who was born with both sets of sexual organs but this is a "a horse of a different color." or rather a chicken. This is a hen who is all girly and feminine laying eggs who up and quits and becomes a rooster, or rather sort of. She grows spurs, a large comb, and her nice round feathers on her neck transform into hackle. Maybe not the fly tying quality but definitely hackle. To top it off, some of these hens who transform   crow. You heard me, crow. That, I'd like to hear. I've raised a number of chickens over the years and I have to wonder. Do they sound really roostery or is the noise more like a strangled chicken? You know the one immature roosters make when they are just learning. It is kind of like a 12 or 13 year old boy's voice which breaks off in mid word or rather crow and squawks and squeaks.


I stumbled across this little side show while researching one night. At first I thought it was a hoax. But no..., the information was from a reputable university agriculture website. I checked further and indeed this is possible -- but rare.


The hen does not really turn into a rooster since she still has all her feminine parts but the hormones get mixed up. For you young'uns, I will explain the birds and the bees of the thing so those of you too young to hear this part put your fingers in your ears and say, "Nuh, nuh, nuh.", really loud. I'll holler when I'm done. A hen has two ovaries. Most female animals do but what is different about a chicken is that the right ovary stops developing when the female chick hatches. The left ovary continues to mature and produce eggs. I can't help but think what would happen if both ovaries went to town producing. "Wow!!" I can't believe a scientist hasn't worked on this project.


The cause of this strange hen turning into a rooster phenomenon is a damaged left ovary. Chicken ovaries produce the hormones oestrogen, progesterone, and testosterone. Read that sentence again. It is oestrogen, not estrogen. I'm really resisting heading off and learning about the difference between estrogen and oestrogen but my to do list today is reining me in. I admit, I did check to see if a hen goes through menopause. You know when the ovaries cease to function anymore on a woman. Why not a chicken? There is a debate out on that one.


It is ridiculous! I think it's a disease. My brain won't shut down with questions that scream, "I want answers!!!"


 I have a theory about this strange rooster look for hens. I can't help but think the oestrogen  and progesterone levels go down in the damaged ovary and the testosterone remains strong. Hence, the roostery look but not the full effect because the testosterone level is not full force like if there were testes. My question though is why does the right ovary not develop at this time? You know how the brain can in part rewire itself if damaged. If it isn't a spare then what is its function? See, the brain won't shut down. I would have loved being a research scientist.


To get the whole scoop from the horses mouth try some further reading in the link below.

http://extension.psu.edu/animals/poultry/topics/general-educational-material/avian-anatomy-and-physiology/the-reproductive-system-and-fertilization/the-hen


See I tried to not make the post all about chickens. Note the horse references thrown in here and there.




YOU CAN PULL YOUR FINGERS OUT OF YOUR EARS NOW!!! I'm done.

How Many Roosters are Needed?

After determining what our chicken set up would allow and what our needs were, we set goals. Ideally we should have 10 to 12 hens per rooster for breeding purposes of course. You do not need a rooster for the hens to lay eggs. But a side note - Did you know roosters like big combed hens? No, not big breasted or ones with a large booty. Nope, a large comb turns them on. And yes, rooster do have favorites. Sir Gallop has already chosen amongst the young pullets, though he does not do so at the exclusion of the others. Now I want to watch to see if he prefers big combed hens like the research study concluded.


Sorry, squirrel there. My mind darts like crazy. Back to the story. We had 2 roosters and 19 hens. The young rooster got along as well with the older rooster in their winter facilities with hens, as the 2 buck goats did in theirs with the does - not well! The young rooster was the easy choice to put in the stew pot but which hens? I can't decide. I chose 3 easy picks but I need charts just like I made for the goats to choose more. I rank each goat in varying categories which meet specific criteria for the perfect specimen for our needs. Some categories are worth more points and there importance is greater. This has moved the cloud of emotions out of the equation. This has cleared the confusion.


Through careful thought, I've just completed the list for chickens. Interesting, our needs have changed from the previous location to here. We have more people to feed. We have different facilities and now the ability to use free range; but we have more predators and lots more snow. Time will tell which of these young pullets born last summer will make the grade. Some look great in one category but not in another. They need scored in order or me to decide who stays and who goes. The bottom number of hens needs to be 12. Maybe that was why some of the eggs last summer were not fertile.


We know we need to lower production costs. But with some molting, some not producing yet, and a couple that were injured and had to be put in the stew pot, (which happens), what is the magical number? We need to find out. We need to chart each hen and know how many eggs she produces. Are they of the quality needed? How long is her molt? Is she broody and if she is, does she begin laying eggs when the chicks are young or does she go straight into a molt? We had a variety last summer.  We need records. The information we need will take time but waiting won't get it for us so we had better begin. 


 Increase costs in the care of the hens means we need to produce more with less. We need to search out ways to save money on feed. We need chickens that better fit our needs for meat and egg production. We need to do this within the facilities we presently have. We need to do it within budget. The we needs are awfully long. I think and I emphasize, I think, we need to use the incubator once a year to produce more meat and not simply allow the hens to set on their eggs like we did last summer in hopes we will get what we need. When to use our incubator is what I'm contemplating now. Timing is the key to success. Anyone have any ideas?


Our home canned broth has almost completely eliminated the use of store bouillon and of course we don't use store broth. Home canned chicken is used more and more over store bought frozen. As I use more of home grown, it creates a higher demand. A demand I did not meet last summer and which means we will run out this winter.  


We are working on a more plant based diet that will help lower the need for meat but that takes time. It means more garden space needs to be established. Meanwhile, with our needs high, we need to figure out how to do more with the limited space we have available. A new, larger chicken coop is not going to happen and the one we have has to house the rabbits and chickens in the winter time. A new summer rabbit loafing shed is in the planning stage and maybe it will work for winter but the question is out on that.


Simply put, we need to do more with less. It will require timing. It will require a better dual purpose chicken. How to do that, I'm not completely sure. I'm researching genetics, reproduction, and more. Lots of changes are in the wind and they include the garden, beef, goats, and rabbits.

How Do Chickens Stay Warm?

This young pullet is saying, "Baby it's cold outside!" Note the fluffed up feathers.  She isn't kidding as the temperature was -13 F. when I got out of bed this morning. I wait to do chores in weather like this until it warms a bit for there has been a breeze of late if not a gale wind that plunges the temperature further to a wind chill of 38 below zero. Hubby went to work in a white out this morning. It lasted for four miles. We live in the worst weather spot for 20 some miles either direction. I tell the grandkids that all the lights for our exit off of the interstate, our exit only, is because we are so special but they know better. It's for the cameras that allow people to see the not so lovely weather we have in the winter time. Our spot is often the reason for road closures. Of course that means we have the greenest spot in the summer too because the snow piles so high. Our little beauty spot is nicknamed, hurricane, flats. Not as bad as where we lived before moving here but it does get breezy at times.

 My lungs protest are protesting this polar weather. They are difficult to treat. Found that out two years ago when in January I spent some time in the hospital. The smart thing is to just not get my lungs mad, so I wait until the temperature is above zero, if possible, before going out. It works out best for the animals too as they don't like coming out of their sheds to drink if it is above zero either. The water freezes almost immediately while the animals try to convince me to bring it to them with insistent bellers. Hauling water twice in a row is not my idea of fun. They prefer to eat when it is a bit more toasty too. The chickens usually don't come out at all except on rare occasion to bask in the sun that beats against the side of the barn. They think it is only worth it if the wind is not blowing. Don't blame them really. The minute I opened the door they feel the frigid cold and hustle to the roost, fluff their feathers out, and tuck their legs up under to keep them warm. Those warm cushions of air between the fluffed up feathers are a nice insulator against the cold.

Even the rooster, Sir Gallop, has his hackle spread out wide. He tucks one foot in his feathers and then switches the supporting leg to tuck it up under where it is warm. That is why they like the roost so both legs stay warm.

 The first thing to freeze on a chicken is the comb. Note Sir Gallop's. The black is the part that froze and it is dead now. It will drop off in a few months. Frost bite is not unusual up north where we live. I've had mild cases of it a number of times myself. For roosters in the winter, it is not so big a deal. Don't know if it lowers their sperm count or not but that is not a concern for who wants to hatch chicks now anyway? It is a problem if a hen's comb freezes. They will stop laying eggs until the injury has healed. The remedy is to create a warm insulated coop. With 22 chickens and six rabbits inside, it stays pretty warm. Yes, we brought home three baby bunnies. I'll have to tell you the story. It is rather funny but that is another blog post. None of the other chicken's combs have frozen but then none of them are as large as the roosters.

We've raised chickens for about 28 years and though we've become pretty good chicken herders, sometimes there is just nothing you can do to get one or two back inside. Sometimes you will get one that just wants to be free-range day and night. Usually it is because they are being bullied but not always. Most chickens are smart enough to head for cover. A couple Wyandotte roosters ended up living with the goats or sheep. They rode  on their backs out from the shed to get a drink or eat with them at the hay feeder, then hitched a ride back. Their feet never touched the ground except to get a drink and up they'd go again to the shed once more. They shared warmth in the insulated shed and did fine through the winter. But we had three chickens that paid the price for not finding a good place to weather the storm and their combs froze along with their toes. One froze both feet so badly we had to kill it because it could not walk. Chickens are just not meant to live outside in the winter.

If you look carefully, you can see a tiny black dot on the comb of this Wyandotte hen. It has been an exceptionally cold winter so far. It has not stopped her from laying or I don't think it has. I've now studied two different scientific studies about how to tell if a hen is a good layer or not. I have my suspicions now about her but we'll talk about that later. I have raised Wyandotte chickens for many year but I may end that as I've found the fox and coyotes here seem to really like them.  This girl is the only one left. They are a gentle, sweet breed, even the roosters.