The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Poultry & Waterfowl => Topic started by: Helencus on May 31, 2012, 12:10:22 pm
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Has this happened to anyone else? I have or should I say HAD a 6 month old hen that was laying small pullet eggs and I noticed it stopped laying and was attempting to crow about 3 weeks ago and now it has cock feathers and is full on crowing! I have heard it can rarely happen but didn't really believe it.. I do now!
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Hi, it does happen! I had a hen that was laying, she was bottom of the pecking order/ THen one day I heard her crowing, and she even tried treading the other hens, and keeping them in order just like a cockerel would. She didn't go as far as growing different feathers, and when I got a cockeral she stopped crowing and went back to being her old self.
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Thing is I already have 2 cockerels so other than she/he was bottom of the pecking order I don't know why.
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Happens when the ovary is damaged Helencus. Sudden surge of Testosterone causes the effect of turning into a cockerel, but they can't reproduce. I read it only happens to 1 in 10,000 hens but perhaps it's rather more common than that.
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We had one like that earlier this year. She was an ex-battery hen, possibly a Sussex Star (white), laid normally for about a year then started trying to crow ??? . The crowing got worse...and then the fox got her :(
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is a very common occurence iv seen it happen twice