Rooster is Rooster: types, description, breeds

2024 Author: Howard Calhoun | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 10:16

Backyard chicken farming is a very lucrative business that allows you to always have fresh eggs and high-quality meat on the kitchen table.

Description of the rooster

In the formation of the chicken herd, a special role is given to the rooster. The latter always looks impressive against the background of modest females: colorful plumage, long flowing tail, pointed feathers in the dorsal and neck areas, spurs on the legs. Adult males have a bright comb and dangling earrings located on the sides of the beak and performing the same function as the comb: directing blood flow to the skin and regulating the body's temperature regime.

The rooster flies rarely and over short distances, in case of danger it prefers to run fast. At the end of autumn - the beginning of the winter period, molting occurs in males, lasting approximately 6 weeks. Crow starts at 4 months of age.

The bird sleeps on one leg, tucks the other under itself and hides its head under the wing on the side where the leg is tucked. Roosters and hens are omnivorous, along withseeds and insects can peck at a small lizard, snake or young mouse. Drinking water is an important factor for successful growth and development. Its deficiency negatively affects the egg production of females.

In the fight for the championship

Rooster is a bird, the progenitor of which is believed to be the bank's jungle hen. The inhabitant of dense forests and bamboo thickets knew how to fly well, rested and spent the night in the trees. Maybe it was from that time that the modern rooster had the habit of climbing as high as possible in order to survey the surrounding area and timely warn the hens about the approach of danger.

Rooster is a prominent handsome man who has several females under his command. He begins to prove his dominant position while still a chicken. This is expressed in the manifestation of aggressiveness towards fellow tribesmen. The competition is tougher the larger the group. It has been noted that the winners in the fight for the championship are most often the owners of leaf-shaped crests. Males with a pod-shaped head ornament, characterized by greater complaisance, have to humbly exist in the background.

Some types of roosters do not want to remain at the lower levels of the hierarchy and every time they fight for a dominant position, most often not in an open fight, but on the sly, by attacks from the back. Sometimes such sudden attacks, stalking exhaust the leader, and he concedes the championship without a fight.

Rooster Fertility

To the opposite sex, the manifestation of interest in males begins with3 months old. Males of light breeds are able to mate up to several dozen times a day, coping with a load of 25 hens. Representatives of heavy breeds manage to fertilize up to 20 females with a mating frequency of no more than 10 times.

The fertility rate of eggs is affected not only by the number of roosters in the poultry yard, but also by their age. It is more difficult to communicate with the weaker sex for young males, who, due to timidity, spend a lot of time on courtship. Settled in a poultry house, they cluster together and try to stay apart somewhere in a secluded corner. Adult hens intimidate young cockerels, do not allow them to feeders. Therefore, often a poultry farmer, in order to avoid such treatment with a stronger sex, first puts cockerels in the chicken coop, and then lets chickens in to them. Then the chickens stop feeling like housewives and show more delicate behavior.

Specific courtship of the opposite sex

In the process of courting females, a rooster is an exemplary gentleman, using a whole set of uncomplicated tricks:

• Luring the "lady of the heart" to the stern. The rooster takes food (a grain or a worm) with its beak, demonstrates it and loudly calls the hens. If none of them responded to the call, it pecks the food itself; if several hens come running, the prey is given to the one that managed to do it first.
• Stumbling on the wing. When a chicken approaches, it walks around it, periodically touches its wing with loose feathers with its foot.
• Chasing a female. In the process of running after a chicken, the rooster pullsneck, bends his head to the ground, ruffles his feathers. This method is more often applied to unfamiliar females, representatives of someone else's house.

The rooster may show indifference to some hens of his herd, and they lay unfertilized eggs. Therefore, some owners who want to get more offspring are forced to keep 2 roosters in one herd.

Rooster classification

Depending on the economic purpose, roosters and hens are classified into the following breeds:

1. Meat. Weight of hens 2, 9-3, 6 kg, males - 3, 4-4, 7 kg.

• Brahma. Decoration for any poultry house. A bird with an extremely decorative appearance: dark or light plumage with a mandatory contrasting collar.
• Konkhinin. The bird is large and massive, with a broad muscular chest and broad back. The tail of the rooster is decorated with short braids. Leaf comb. Short curved beak. Red-orange eyes. The plumage is magnificent, it also hides the legs.

2. Meat-egg. Weight of roosters - 3.5-4.1 kg, hens - 2.5-3.2 kg.

• Kuchinsky anniversary. It has a lush swelling, a small comb. It tolerates heat and cold well. The color of the plumage of roosters is red. The wings have a black stripe with a green tint.
• Adler silver. Compact build, medium size, deep long body, straight and wide back. Full chest, powerful strong bones. Small round head with a medium-sized crest.

3. Egg. The average weight of hens is 1.8-2.2 kg, males - 2.7-3.4 kg. Rooster comb for the most partleaf-shaped, after the 2nd-3rd tooth it is inclined to one side. Egg production of chickens - 200-265 eggs per year.

• Loman Brown is a well-known breed characterized by increased egg production. Its representatives are unpretentious in content. They have a large physique. Chick viability - 98%.
• Leggorn. Medium-sized. They have a wedge-shaped body, a proportional physique, a rounded, slightly protruding chest. Elongated back, concave in the middle. The body is shaped like an isosceles triangle

4. Decorative:

• Dutch white-crested. These are the owners of an unusual appearance. Medium-sized. Characterized by a compact body. The plumage is tight fitting. On the head is a magnificent beautiful crest of white feathers, resembling a spherical cap. There are also feathers at the base of the beak.
• Chinese silk. Decorative light breed, quite mobile, characterized by silk plumage.

5. Fighting. The first roosters were tamed in Europe, Asia, Africa for fighting. The domestication of poultry for human consumption originated in India.

• Orlovskaya. Presumably it was bred by Prince Orlov-Chesmensky. It was widespread in the 19th century in Russia. Outwardly unusual and beautiful. It is characterized by high egg production and excellent taste of meat.
• Azil. Broad, short-legged, bony, with close-fitting plumage, squat. Fighting character is strongly expressed.
• Indian fighting. Large, muscular breed with strong limbs, wide stancelegs, shiny plumage. Personality - pugnacious.

Folk beliefs

A lot of beliefs are connected with the rooster among the people. Thus, the Eastern Slavs considered singing to be the most important function of the bird. It is the cock's cry that indicates the beginning of a new day, the retreat of darkness and evil spirits. With its scandalous disposition, the rooster is a rather sensitive creature that can predict weather changes. On the eve of a rainy day, even with a very clear sky, the bird becomes restless, singing randomly, frightened.

Black roosters are considered quite rare. These birds have long been attributed to witchcraft and attributed to them a direct connection with the other world. But keeping such a bird on the farm is considered a good sign: a black rooster reliably protects property and its owner from thieves and other ill-wishers.

The Slavs traditionally sacrificed just such a bird when building a house. In the cultures of many peoples, a black rooster is considered a symbol of material well-being and prosperity.