As the popularity of keeping backways chickens continues to increase due to more and more people wanting fresh, free range eggs that their own chickens produced, the number of feral or stray roosters is also increasing.
This is starting to become a surprising problem in towns and cities with a large chicken keeping community and we often see people reaching out to ask how they are able to get rid of a stray rooster as it is not as easy as it sounds but the rooster will crow and wake people early in the day.
In some areas, animal control may remove a stray rooster from your area but in the majority of places, animal control will not get involved as a rooster is not classed as a dangerous animal leaving you to remove the rooster from the area.
In some cases, you may be able to find the owner of the rooster on social media but in most cases, you will have to catch the rooster or scare it away.
There are a huge number of different strategies that you are able to use to remove a stray rooster if you do choose to remove the rooster yourself.
Keep in mind, many roosters are more dangerous than most people initially think, especially if you are not used to handling chickens and a rooster will usually reach its feet up and do its best to claw you while potentially pecking at you too.
If it manages to get close to your eyes, a common target for roosters, it can cause long term damage to you.
Will Animal Control Get Rid Of A Stray Rooster?
In some areas animal control may come and collect a stray rooster in your area but this is rare as the majority of animal control departments do only deal with dangerous animals.
There are private pest control companies in the majority of large towns and cities that you are able to use to come and collect the rooster but there will be a fee associated with their services.
If your city’s animal control department will not come and deal with the stray rooster it is probably a better idea to just get a quote from a private pest control company and pay them to remove the rooster if possible.
It can work out much better and reduce the amount of time and effort required by you to go off and catch the rooster yourself even though you will have to pay for their service due to being a private business.
We have seen some posts on social media of people saying that the they were able to get their local pest control department to come and deal with a stray rooster by telling them that it was a direct risk to young children who play in the area though.
We have no idea if this will work for you but it can be worth a try in some situations as your local animal control department may come out and deal with the stray rooster for free.
How To Get Rid Of A Stray Rooster!
One of the easiest and safest ways to get rid of a stray rooster is to let it know that there is a dog on your property even if you have to borrow a dog from a friend for a day or so.
Dogs will often try to get the rooster and act aggressively towards it and there is usually no need for you to let the dog off its leash to actually chase the rooster, once the bird knows there is a dog, it will often try to find a new home.
In some cases, this can backfire though as the rooster may just go into a tree and stay there until the dog has gone but this can also work to your advantage as the rooster will often sleep in that tree so you know exactly where it is while it is sleeping and its guard is down.
This presents an opportunity for you to catch the rooster much easier than you would otherwise be able to if it was on the ground and awake.
You are often able to make your own rooster traps with cardboard boxes or dog transport cages and a little string with this often being a good option if you have a suitable box or dog transport cage.
You simply bait the box or cage with some break to get the rooster inside of it and then pull the string to get the box to fall and trap the bird or to pull the cage door closed and then you can transport the bird elsewhere to release it.
Is It Easy To Find The Owner Of A Stray Rooster?
Due to the power and reach of social media, it can be surprisingly easy to find the owner of a stray rooster and have them come to collect their bird saving you the hassle.
Most large towns and cities have backyard chicken based social media groups that you can check to see if anyone has lost one of their birds of may know someone who has.
Even if they don’t know the person who has lost their rooster, some of the people on those social media groups may actually come and get rid of the stray rooster for you as some people are always looking to expand their collection.
Although this can take a little time, it is free and often safer than trying to remove the bird yourself so we would recommend this course of action if you are unable to get your cities animal control department or a private pest control department to collect your bird for you.
If you are unable to find a local backyard chicken group for your area then you are always able to post a status update asking if anyone may know someone who has lost their rooster.
It can be surprising how quickly those status messages can go and we have seen owners reunited with a huge range of pets due to them being shared by other people in your city.
Conclusion
That brings our article going over how to get rid of a stray rooster to an end. We really wouldn’t recommend that anyone who is not experienced with handling chickens even tries to remove the rooster from their property as it is more dangerous than most people initially realize. There is often a much better option available to you but it may take a little time of cost a little money depending on the situation.
