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The Bantam of the Opera

what is it?! [picture]

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I bought my 3 bantams 2 weeks ago and was told they are definately all girls however my big sis read up about chickens and thinks that one of them is a boy. He does look quite manly, he has a bigger tail than my other two bantams and it looks like he has spurs that were cut off. havent heard him crow but he stood up to mrs. weasly and they had a big fight. dont know if this is any indication. . im pretty clueless all round really.

is there any way to sex a chicken for definite. we havent heard him crow though.

 

Here he is:

 

picture024si6.jpg

 

:( if he is a boy and starts crowing ill have to get rid of him which i wouldnt want to do because he is such a lovely chicken.

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just been reading up on another site.

 

Differences to spot between a cockerel and hen -

 

cockerel -

 

bigger comb and wattles and a young rooster will develop a comb before a hen.

Sturdy long legs

tail - stumpy and curved

a male will begin to act "manly" and voice will change from chirping to attempting to crow

a cockerel will stand alert and tall

 

a trick is to sail something light past their head with your hands and watch their reactions - the cockerel will immediately stand elert and erect with their heads upright and a peculiar chirping sound if its a hen it will crouch and remain silent !!! :wink:

 

maybe give it a try?

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thanks very much for your help, i just thought he might be a boy because i heard a strangled cry from his run this morning, it sounded like he was practicing. maybe my neighbours wont mind if hes quite, he's only tiny so i cant imagine he will be too noisy. :think:

 

also, do they always crow in teh morning or just when they go outside because he didnt crow till like 10 and by taht time my neighbours were already out at work

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Hi there, I think it's a girl, the tail doesn't lok particularly flamboyant (big word for this time of night!!) We have a Leghorn who I was convinced was a boy for all the same reasons, had a very upright comb, upright tail, just strutted around really looking "manly" and did everything bar cock a doodle do. But she was just a gobby female in the end. If you hold their wings out, at the "join" where you would clip their wings, I was told that if the short feathers were rounded not pointy then it was almost certainly a girl. Eventually ours laid an egg which sorted our question once and for all, what breed is yours? maybe some hens are just more "masculine" than others? :shock:

 

Good luck

 

Mrs B

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Does look rather boyish to me too!

Re the crowing - you could try your luck and keep him until someone notices :? The house at the back of our garden has hens with a cockerel, but I think he must be quite young as he just sounds like a dogs squeaky toy at the moment :lol: And he only tends to crow during the day so never bothers anyone. Good luck with him - he is a good looker. 8)

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i think lucius finally answered the question for me, i definately heard him learning to cfow this morning when i let him out. he is a bantams orpington so it wasnt very loud, will it get alot louder do you think? he wasnt very good either, like a teenager with his voice breaking. :lol:

 

but he only started trying to crow when i let him out so maybe if i left them in the eglu till about 9 when i leave for college, my neighbours woulda left by then and maybe they wont notice? :( i really dont want to get rid of him, hes lovely and i cant deal with introducing more chickens, im terrible at it.

we could only hear him crowing when we went outside, couldnt hear it over the tv, maybe my neighbours wont either.

 

eeek worried :cry:

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The hackle feathers in the first picture are pointy, which means he's a boy I'm afraid. And yes, the strangled sounds you hear are him starting to crow - my two 3 month old boys have just started.

 

If he's only a youngster, his spurs haven't been cut off, they just start as buds.

 

I hope you have a quiet one that you can keep. If he's the only cockeral in the area, you might get away with it because he'll have no-one else to compete with. Usually, when one starts crowing, the others nearby start too - the competition can go on all day!

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