You may not need a rooster, but you might just want one.

ARTICLE & PHOTOS BY BRUCE INGRAM

Ideally, we should all be blessed to have one great spouse. In our chickenraising careers, we should all be fortunate to have one great rooster. So I’ve been doubly blessed to have Elaine as the perfect wife for 42½ years and Don as the perfect rooster for the past six years.

NOT ALWAYS A BLESSED EVENT

Of course, owning a roo is not always a good thing, and Elaine and I certainly learned so when we first started raising chooks, which happened to be industrial Rhode Island Reds purchased at a local farm-supply store. Hybrid Reds, as is typically true with industrial birds, have had the broodiness trait bred out of them, and, at least from our experience, one of the results has been hyper-aggressive roosters.

Even though our industrial Red hens weren’t likely to ever raise chicks, we still wanted the experience of having a rooster as flock leader. Thus, we methodically culled five of the six cockerels we received in a straight-run purchase, leaving only Little Jerry that we deemed as the bravest and brightest of the sextet.

Jerry acted acceptably until he was about 18 months old; then he became a terror — attacking Elaine whenever she turned her back on him and rushing me whenever I entered the run. My wife became so afraid of Jerry that she hesitated to even gather eggs, and then what was inevitable happened: Jerry lost his fear of me, biting me on the hand and trying to spur me at the same time. The next day, Little Jerry became Sunday dinner and served as workday lunches for three more days.