What Do You Do With the Roosters?

Japanese Bantam cross rooster, hatched and raised by the mother hen. He is one of 6 roosters of her 13 chicks. What to do with him is a dilemma. He is hardly big enough to even bother to pluck!

When a mother hen hatches a brood of chicks from eggs, about half will be roosters. When the mamma sheep has babies, some will be little rams. So it goes with the cows, the goats, the rabbits, alpacas, llamas and the piggies. What becomes of the males? They are eaten.

It is sad. The Fat Ewe Farm was not originally a meat farm, and it is still not one. The problem is that animals have babies and only one or two ram lambs are kept for breeding, so the rest are raised until they weigh something, and slaughtered for food. It is cost prohibitive to save the pelts and have them tanned at one hundred and twenty dollars per pelt tanning. They can only be sold for the same amount of money. Unless tanned at home, what is the point? The wool can be sent to the mill and a credit will be written, but poor quality wool with vegetative matter does not draw much money.

So the plan is to shear the rams two months prior to slaughter, slaughter at home, save the pelts, tan them at home, and eat the meat. It is the unfortunate consequence of being male. Too many roosters spoil the coop, but a rooster in the pot makes mighty fine soup.

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