raising chickens | hen is actually a rooster

what do you mean Dottie is crowing?... For a couple of weeks now, we've been awoken by Clark's morning crow. At least we always thought it was Clark. I mean, why wouldn't it be, he's our rooster. But see, here's the thing. When we'd hear the crowing, it was always in the early morning when they were still in the coop. So we never actually saw Clark crow. We simply assumed.

(Clark the rooster with Turtle)

Dottie, our beautiful Silver Wyandotte, has always been the most aggressive of the hens. At just a few days old, she was always the first one to come up and peck your hand. She was quite bossy with the other hens too, but we thought that was just her becoming the Alpha female of the group.

Just up to last week, Dottie didn't show any visual signs of being a rooster. Her feathers were not super shiny, she wasn't developing spurs, no comb obviously, and her tail feathers were the same of the rest of the hens. Clark has all the tell tale visual rooster signs, while Dottie registered D—none of the above. Then, this past Monday my husband called me at work. He puts on the speakerphone and I hear cockle-doodle-doo. I'm like, thanks for letting me hear Clark. Tom replys, that was Dottie. There she was crowing while standing on the highest point of the coop. Uhm, Dottie isn't a Dottie. Bummer.

Without a doubt, within the week, Dottie has become much more rooster-like in appearance with her, I mean his, tail feathers shooting out. The sad part is that we have to find a new home for Dottie. We can't have two roosters, they could kill each other in such a small flock. We're trying to find a place where they'll let Dottie be more of a rooster and less of a dinner. He's a really cool bird and we're definitely going to miss him. If anyone knows of a good home for Dottie, please give me a holler. Thanks!