new to raising poultry/ semi emergency

[masauerwald]

hi everyone! i am in need of some major advice. so i live in Los Angeles and my family and i have pretty much converted our home into our own little urban farm. anyway we decided to raise some chickens and we got 4 hens as babies. well they are growing up and one of them is a rooster it turns out, or at least i'm pretty sure he/she is. anyway living in the city, roosters aren't exactly legal because they'll crow and wake the whole block up. i was wondering if there is anyway to neuter a rooster...i dont want to get rid of him, i love all 4 of my chickens and they have become part of our little organic family. please pelase please tell me if you know of a vet willing to neuter a chicken, or just if it's even possible! thanks!-molly

[Patrick]

That's far from an emergency. Yes, it can and has been done, many times. It's called caponizing, but with the super high production of our modern meat strains, and the inefficiency of raising the capons to market size, it's rarely done anymore. You might find some old farmer who knows how to do it, but their methods had somewhat a high risk, not that there isn't a risk with any surgery.
You are lucky, living in southern California. There are probably more avian veterinarians there than anywhere else in the world. How would most people here know which veterinarians in your area would caponize a chicken? You should start calling and asking the veterinarians that question. You might find few who have a lot of experience with chickens, but anyone who has experience with other invasive surgeries on other birds, should be able to help you. You'll just have to find one who is willing.

[Leo]

Don't some roosters still crow after caponizing?

[gregrag]

Hi Molly--instead of neutering your rooster--you could have a Larynjectomy performed, removing the vocal cords would work in your densly populated area--ask about that. I have found that most vets don't want to fool with poultry--and I live in the country.There are some breeds of chickens that do not crow much--Light Brahmas are one, and the hens lay pretty good. wishing you the best with your adventure!!!!!

[Evy]

Originally Posted by gregrag

Hi Molly--instead of neutering your rooster--you could have a Larynjectomy performed, removing the vocal cords would work in your densly populated area--ask about that. I have found that most vets don't want to fool with poultry--and I live in the country.There are some breeds of chickens that do not crow much--Light Brahmas are one, and the hens lay pretty good. wishing you the best with your adventure!!!!!

Most vets refuse to do that surgery & it would cost way more than any bird is worth if they did.

[ritterhahn]

I have no experience with caponizing, and would be interested to know from those who have performed this as to whether the caponized cock still crows. To me, crowing is a secondary sexual characteristic and I would be curious to learn if it persists after modification: seems at least very probable that it might, but experience is the true teacher.

Evy is entirely correct. The procedure is known as ‘devoicing’, and is widely considered to be inhumane. It was formerly used on peacocks and dogs. Even if you find a veterinarian willing to do it (and I doubt you could – you would also risk being judged inhumane by activist veterinary staff), it would probably cost several hundred dollars, and the chances of the cock surviving would not justify the expense. Those experienced with chickens will tell you that their respiratory systems are rather delicate compared to other livestock: fiddling around with them is risky.

According to the reports I have heard over the years, I admit they are anecdotal, many agree that the procedure when performed on cocks often sees a return of crowing over time. The processes whereby a cock crows are fascinating – and concern more than the larynx, so mere surgical modification of that organ would on the surface seem to agree with my anecdotal evidence. I think that as the surgical site heals, the full crowing ‘mechanism’ tends to grind back into action. There are other ‘old time’ methods like cutting the bird’s tongue out, or putting it in a cage low enough that the cock cannot stretch his neck up to crow: neither works; both are varying shades of cruel.

Chickens, I never tire of saying, are not pets. Our obligations to them are to meet their needs in nutrition, housing, and socialization (i.e., providing flock mates for these social animals, understanding the rules of their ‘society’: pecking order, why cocks fight each other, etc.). If you want to keep this cockerel, and fear the repercussions try: checking local municipal code to be sure there is a ban (even in places that permit them, a neighbour’s complaint is enough to receive a citation); talk to your neighbours – maybe if you take precautions to keep the cockerel closed up until midday to suppress early morning crowing they will be more tolerant.

If you really want to keep the bird build a fully enclosed aviary with a ventilation system. This would deaden the sound of the crowing. It would not cost much more than the price of devoicing, and you would not have to mutilate a bird to do it.

If in the end you realize you do not have the means to keep the bird and no designs on eating it, find a home for it in the country or a permissive suburb where it will not be punished for being what it is: a chicken.

Richard

[ritterhahn]

P.S. Concerning ‘There are some breeds of chickens that do not crow much--Light Brahmas are one…’

I have noticed that there is variation in crowing among roosters, and the trait would seem to be heritable (the long crowers, for instance, but maintaining the trait takes hard selection), but there is no breed that one could say as a breed that the cocks do not crow much. Are we talking about hatchery Brahmas, Brahmas from exhibition stock but kept in informal flocks, or exhibition specimens? The statement is subjective and simply false when applied to wide numbers of birds – especially for those where such a trait is not a category of selection. And so far as I know, there is no flock where it is.

Game breeds supposedly crow more often, and younger cockerels reportedly crow with greater frequency than old cocks – and then a cock out of hearing of another cock is supposed to crow less frequently – but it is all so much splitting of hairs. Larger birds sometimes have deeper ‘voices’ and the sound does not carry so far as a shrill crow, but at 2 A.M. (cocks crow more than just at dawn) the fine distinctions between a soprano or basso profundo are not going to make much difference to the neighbors as they ring up the local authorities.

R