Oh how sad, I wouldn't put them back together. I don't know much about chickens I've never had any but I do hope you figure something out. Good Luck

It might be a lost cause, but you can try. It's going to be tough. You can try making a seperate run for the other roo, but be careful to give him an equal number of hens. Make the dividing wire right up against the other roos' pen so they have to glare at each other through the wire. It might help them to get used to each other enough to tolerate each other without TOO much fighting, but they WILL fight.

You can also reassert YOUR spot as Head Roo and stand by to break up any fights in your presence. If you click on my 'My Page' link, there is a info there on how to tame roos that might help you.

It sounds like the boys have simply reached maturity and this is how it's going to be. They might settle their differences in time and coexist peacefully, but I wouldn't bet on it. Good luck, though!

Velvet ~:>

Most of my roosters get along amicably, save if one has been out of the flock for illness or escaping. The easiest and most humane solution if you are not short of roosters is to try to find him a flock of his own and sell or give him away. If you don't be present in the chicken population 24/7 and they do start to fight, you'll most likely find a mutilated roo the next morning. It's really unneccessary and very disturbing to find one blinded. As I said if one is injured, even if he becomes submissive, the dominant roos are likely to pick on him until he sucumbs. I'm sorry to have to say this. I know exactly how you feel.

Why do you want either of them? If you only have 3 pullets,then at most you want one, and I would recommend none. You are dealing with the original "chicken brain" and the sole aim of the rooster is to breed with as many females as possible - and worse, as often as possible. Any other male that comes in his way has to be got rid of - ie killed. You will have, at least to begin with, 5 very upset birds, soon to be reduced to a maximum of 4, and then the one remaining cock will mate so often with your 3 females that they will suffer, probably be injured, and possibly even killed. That is sheer cruelty. Get rid of the cocks and have 3 happy pullets. Old McDonald.

I agree with old mcdonald. Roo's introduce ALOT of stress into a flock even under the best circumstances. And if your goal is eggs you might find having a rooster around (with only a few hens) will stress the girls and result in fewer eggs.

Old McDonald has my vote.. I have 14 hens no Roos.. Nice happy hens and pretty eggs.. I have noticed that they posture in front of me as though I am the Rooster. I have an Ameraucana hen(Sophie) who is the head hen honcho and who keeps things in order.. Kit

Thank you for all of your advice. We've had 2 hurricanes pass by here and today is the first day of sunshine since my original post. We ended up separating the 2 roos and making sure that they each had dry shelter during the storms.

About 5 days ago, a local farmer brought by 6 hens which we have introduced between our 2 roos. Each has 3 hens now. Since we've been back, we have spent a lot of time with each of our roos. This and the hens have mellowed them back to the gentle birds we knew before we left and they were separated. Our houdini roo still gets out from time to time and he has even been with the other roo but they didn't fight. They just picked at the dirt for tasty treats and hung out together.