Next door's cock...

[mojito55]

...erel is driving me up the wall. Since they decided out of the blue to become chicken farmers two months ago, I have been woken from my much-needed beauty sleep every day around 6am. I am then treated to its shrill, dramatic noise (squawking? barking? whatever) ALL MORNING. I thought they do it a few times at sunrise and then shut up? Is this one broken? And WIBU to chuck a fox over their fence?

I live just outside a major city, all family homes and small blocks of flats. It's definitely no rural farming community! I've admittedly not spoken to them about it, as we don't have the best relationship due to some pretty dramatic parking wars. Will definitely be putting in a noise complaint though, thank you for the suggestion

I ended up with a cockerel after hatching out some eggs. Neighbour wasn’t impressed and even though we’re rural I despatched the cockerel A’s didn’t want to upset anyone.

Send them a cock ring in the post 👍🏻

We had this. We live in built up area with terraces. Neighbour was unaware that is considered cruel to keep chickens in small concrete backyards. It crowed 24/7 possibly because the poor thing was not exactly happy. We have urban foxes too so I'm surprised it lasted long. Called PCSO and she had it re-homed to the City farm where I suspect it is living the life of riley with it's little chickeny friends - much kinder. I grew up in a rural area but on the whole the farms were spaced fairly far from residential and certainly not in built up areas where it's likely to be annoying.

a couple of things to think about before you complain to Env Health OP.

1. a formal complaint is a registered complaint. so if you sell your house within 5 years of making it then its one of those things that you need to declare on your sellers information. can sometimes put potential purchasers off but not if you put (resolved) in brackets.

1. if you are working from home then you have to build up a resilience to the type of street noises/surroundings noises. what if the cockerel goes and someone gets a yappy dog? I do wonder if you are a bit noise sensitive Op and its worth thinking about how to mitigate your sensitivity if this is the case.

@mummymeister it was me not OP who mentioned working from home. These neighbours have a menagerie of animals, including dogs which bark frequently, and pigeons, and chickens, and he often plays music when gardening (not every day but more than once each week for a few hours). I’m quite content with this as although it is annoying no one is entitled to silence. But crowing is a particularly unpleasant and intrusive nuisance.

The other side neighbours have young children who are pretty rowdy, again this is fine. I don’t think I’m noise sensitive, I think a cockerel crowing is extremely loud and irritating.

It is good advice about the having to declare to sellers though. We wouldn’t have been looking to move but I don’t know how much longer I can bear the cockerel for.

We have an accidental rooster and we’ve taken several measures to reduce his crowing.
From March to October he sleeps in a very dark box (he can breathe just fine) which means he goes off at 7.30-8.00am rather than at shit-off o’clock.
He also wears a special collar when he’s particularly crowy. They go through phases; all things considered he’s not a committed crower and I canvassed our neighbours and continue to check. They all love him and he’s a local character. We’re semi-rural.
We had one guy come over a couple of years ago to ask if we could reduce his crowing (it was his first summer), so we did and that was that.

Google the No Crow Rooster Collar and suggest a box. Some people bring their roosters indoors at night, too. We tried ours under the stairs in his box but if one of us woke in the night for the bathroom, he’d think it was playtime.

He’s a beloved family pet and a great dad, so we’re happy to go the extra mile to keep everyone happy.

Our dark box works for our roo. They’re all different. Ours is a relatively quiet guy, though - you’ll get the occasional crow throughout the day and the even more occasional volley, then that’s it.

When a hen has laid an egg, though...that cackling!

Those recommending keeping a cockerel in a short box, or tightening something around its throat so it can't breath to crow are vile.

If you don't want a crowing cockerel re-home it, don't subject it to that sort of treatment

The collars aren’t tight and they don’t impede breathing. They stop the special air sac that they use for crowing from filling properly. They still crow, but it’s muted.

Two cockerels near to us, one next door. As it gets lighter they will start crowing earlier, I'm afraid.

That said, we just learned to sleep through it. It can be done.

Hens lay eggs with or without a cockerel. The eggs just can't hatch if there is no cockerel to fertilise them before laying. A cockerel generally keeps the hens in line, rounds them up at bedtime to go back in the coup etc.. We used to keep hens but had no cock due to the noise. However even the hens were pretty damn noisy. It wasn't an issue in our rural place but once we moved to a town they became an embarassment and eventually I rehomed them.

In summer they are noisy from around 4am.

Yeah! They’re so funny to watch when they’re doing their strutting colonel act! We love our boy and we’ve even been known to cuddle him once or twice...

We raise any boy chicks till they are just about to crow, then we have them for Sunday road - best meat we ever had.

roast*

You’d be waiting a long time with ours and for not much reward! They’re silkies so they don’t start crowing or treading until 6-7 months!

We had a roo in last year’s hatch and he’s now living up north with his own ladies!

We're fairly rural and near neighbour said they were thinking about getting chickens. They had moved from a big city so asked if they needed a cock to get eggs. I explained that, in the chicken world, as in the human, the girls produce eggs, but if you want 'em fertilised you need a cock. They were happy just to get hens. However someone further down the hill has a cock which crows from sunrise but only a couple of times. I quite like it. Although an American friend was a bit taken aback when I said that I had been woken by my neighbour's cock. Apparently they don't like the word and use rooster. My 99-year-old neighbour on the other side uses 'cock' with no embarrassment.

The collars aren’t tight and they don’t impede breathing

The manufacturers own website suggests feeding only crumble (as opposed to pellets) so obviously they are tight enough to impede eating...

Look, we tried the collar and it didn’t make much difference to his crows. While he was wearing it he ate pellets and lived perfectly normally.
Considering that most other male chicks in the uk end up being flung alive into a grinder, I don’t think he’s done too badly.

I should imagine the crumb advice is erring on the side of caution.
If you think rehoming is a safe option, then take a quick look at some of the chicken forums and FB pages with desperate people trying to find homes for their roos before they have to cull them.
You’ll also see smallholders posting about the badly-injured roos they find dumped on their doorsteps after they’ve been used for fighting.
You want a crusade, go after arseholes like that.

we just learned to sleep through it. It can be done. Balls can it, not should it. It shouldn.t have to be 'learned' - a cocks crow is antisocial in towns, and those suggesting yappy dogs are similar - well, they can be complained about as well.

I live in a small town and my NDN has chickens, dogs, cats, children - all 'normal' day-to-day noise (except the cock). A dog barking all day is not normal, and indicates that the dog is being ill-treated or left alone for long periods. Yapping all day should be complained about.

Re 'declaring your noise complaint' - a complaint can be mad informally, and anonymously. Only when it goes to the next step is it 'formal' and you need to declare your name.

You’ll also see smallholders posting about the badly-injured roos they find dumped on their doorsteps after they’ve been used for fighting.

I meant to say used for fighting after going free to a good home.

we have a new yappy dog next door to us that came with new neighbours. TV gets turned up (all the time that we are in) as we are not getting involved in a neighbour dispute

I have 4 hens and a cockerel. Before I got them I check with my neighbours on either side if they were okay with us getting them, they were fine, and one of the neighbours already had chickens.

It all went fine until last year where next door neighbours had a total of 26 chickens of varying ages (they breed and sell at a nearby auctions) of which 6 were cockerels. Then we got an anonymous complaint from the council, and so did next door. Eventually we found out that it was a back neighbour who had complained. Next door sold all of their chickens but we kept ours. We have not heard from the council since.

When my cockerel (he's actually fairly quiet) dies from old age I am not going to replace him. The 6 cockerels next door have put me off for life!

If there are hens they are also noisy, they squark and squark every time they lay an egg

This is his box. It’s a rabbit box and he’ll stride quite happily into it when it’s bedtime.
We’re getting a new shed in a few months, so we’ll probably start putting the box in there as I do worry it’s not as secure as the coop.