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Noisy Cockerels
The scientific basis for cock crowing is that it’s part of the male’s territorial display. He’s declaring that this is his patch! The dawn chorus is also a territorial display, with male blackbirds, thrushes, etc, making the same declaration. The difference between their ‘crowing’ and that of the cock, is that it’s less strident and more musical to the ear, but all male birds crow in one form or another.
Years ago, most poultry keepers kept a cock, and people in rural areas would have accepted crowing as part of the normal sounds of the countryside. Neighbours might not always have enjoyed the early morning clarion call, but they certainly would not have complained to the council about it!
Today people will put up with noisy neighbours, screaming aircraft, the rumble and vibrations of trains and the constant roar of traffic punctuated with the sounds of sirens, but let a cock start crowing down the road and they start to complain.
Perhaps where a small fowl is concerned, people feel empowered to change the situation, while general and traffic noises are on too large a scale for them. An additional problem is that councils are becoming less tolerant and are likely to uphold such complaints. Cock crowing has come to be regarded as a ‘noise nuisance’ in law. Incidentally, the word ‘crowing’ is from the Anglo-Saxon word ‘crawan’, meaning a shrill noise.
It is not just an urban problem, more a general attitude of mind. There was a recent case of a long established poultry-breeding farm that obviously needed to keep a number of males. All was well until some new bungalows were built half a mile away. The new residents complained and the complaint was upheld, in spite of the fact that the poultry farm had been there first. Pressure was put on the farm either to move the cocks away or to do away with them completely.
As I see it, there is no justification for complaints about cockerels crowing during the day. There are a dozen worse noises to put up with in suburbia. The problem is early morning crowing in the summer time when a cockerel can get going around 3.30am! They are not so bad in winter when it is darker for longer. Even so, if people did not get so incensed about the situation, they could probably sleep through it.
Some years ago, we kept a range of poultry and a number of cockerels. One of them was a pretty Silver Partridge Dutch bantam cock that would let fly repeatedly with a piercing screech in the early hours. I asked my next-door neighbour whether she minded. She looked genuinely puzzled and said that she had never noticed it.
Crowing is not always regarded as a disadvantage. In some parts of the world they have crowing competitions. In Germany, for example, the Bergse Kraaier (or Bergische Kraher) breed has a reputation for having the longest and loudest crow. It is thought to have been introduced by refugee monks to the village of Wuppertal, and then crossed with local breeds. It was first shown in 1853 and recognised in the German Standard in 1885.
Turkey, too, is a country where selection has taken place to produce top performers, with the average crow lasting for 30 seconds.
In 1901, an anonymous writer described a crowing competition in the USA: “The mode of operation is to place the cages containing the roosters in a long row, and then one bird will generally set the others crowing. A marker for each bird, appointed by the organizer of the show, has as his duty to note carefully the number of crows made by his bird. Each competitor puts up one dollar and the winner takes all.”
Cock Crowing
Copyright © Katie Thear 2005
In the USA today, there is, according to Loyl Stromberg in his book Poultry of the World, a cockerel crowing contest where the winner is the bird that does the most ‘cock-a-doodle-doos’ in a 30-minute period. (Anyone who has stood in a hall of several hundred fowl at a poultry show for a couple of days might be inclined to award the prize to the cock who crowed least!)
“This contest,” to quote Stromberg, “Was inspired by one in Wales, England.” (Oh dear! I do find it tiresome when people do not appreciate that Wales is a different country, and not part of England).
Poultry keeping is becoming more popular, and many more poultry keepers would like to keep a cock or two and try some breeding. However, the present situation means that only people living in really rural conditions can keep cockerels, without encountering harassment. Is there any way in which this problem can be resolved?
All sorts of things have been tried, but none of them have met with any great success. One idea was to put a bar across the roof, inside the house, so that the cock would be unable to stretch his neck in order to crow. Faced with that obstacle, most canny cockerels would just jump down from the perch and crow from the floor.
However, there are some people who swear that it can work, as long as the bar is suspended loosely so that it swings when the head touches it.The continued swinging, it is claimed has a deterring effect. Has anyone tried this successfully?
Another approach was to keep the male in his own house and block up all the chinks through which light can enter. The problem is that the flow of air is also restricted. He would probably stop crowing, but for the wrong reason.
In parts of the USA, people have taken their cockerels to the vet in order to have the vocal cords removed, but then that is also the country where cats’ claws are removed in order to stop them scratching the furniture. Thankfully, such procedures are not allowed in Britain on humanitarian grounds.
The best approach would be to have a cockerel house that is situated at the point farthest away from neighbours, with the door on the opposite side to the prevailing winds. It would need to be very well insulated with the type of insulation that is currently used in recording studios. In theory, it ought to be possible to produce a (near) soundproof house but I have yet to find anyone who has done it.
Crowing hen
Although I’ve never experienced it with any of my own hens, a crowing hen is a fairly well known phenomenon. It is usually caused by hormonal changes. These may be as a result of an infected ovary, or a tumour in the same area. In the case of the former, the infection can often be cleared up with antibiotics, or it may clear of its own accord. With the latter, there is nothing that can be done.
There may be other signs, apart from the crowing, including an enlarged comb and the development of male plumage after the moult. She may also try to mount other hens. If the cause is an infected ovary, and it clears up, she will probably revert to her usual state.
In 1474, there was a case where a ‘cock’ was burned at the stake for witchcraft, because ‘he’ laid eggs! Oh dear! Hopefully we now live in more enlightened times.
Copyright © Katie Thear 2005