Rooster dead??

Poultry keeper12

Songster
Mar 27, 2018
159
112
101
Hey, so let me start off with this morning, this morning my road island red rooster was active doing is normal routine, when I walked out about 5-6 hours later i found him dead, so what could have caused his death, I checked everywhere for signs no blood no bad bites nothing, it was raining but the other chickens were fine, it wasn't sick, but I don't know if its normal for a rooster to die with his lions main sticking up like it was fighting but I would see blood, also it was lying in the middle of the outside pen all of the other chickens were fine, if there is any questions or comments please let me know.
 

azygous

Enabler
Premium Feather Member
12 Years
Dec 11, 2009
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I once had a rooster that had a seizure in front of me as the chickens were roosting for the night. I grabbed him and that halted whatever was causing the seizure. He was fine until a couple months later when I found him dead under his roosting perch in the morning.

Roosters, and some hens, too, can have heart attacks and die suddenly. Another common cause of sudden death is insecticide poisoning. Do you remember any recent use of pesticides around where he was found?
 

Hen Pen Jem

Crowing
Sep 19, 2017
1,691
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Southern California
Greetings Poultry keeper12,

I too had a similar event with my beloved rooster, Mr. Bumni, (Boomi). He was a two year old Barred Rock. He had just recovered from an upper respiratory illness 10 days prior to his death. On that day, I had an emergency with one of my hens. When I went up to get her from her pen, I looked over at him, in an adjacent pen. He was happy and robust, crowing and strutting around. Two hours later, when I went back to check on the chickens, I was stunned to find him dead.

He was laying stiff, on his back, with his legs straight and his eyes closed. Not a feather was out of place, no blood or wounds of any kind. However, his brother was standing in the pen with him. He, did have some pecks to his comb, but nothing serious. I concluded that there was some rooster scuffling, as roosters do. And my, Mr. Bumni, just wasn't up to it, and he suffered a devastating heart attack. His brother was in grief over his death for many weeks after.

So sorry for the loss of your rooster. :(

God Bless and peace to you.
 

Hen Pen Jem

Crowing
Sep 19, 2017
1,691
5,514
362
Southern California
Sometimes it's hard to tell if a chicken is sick. When my rooster fell ill with the respiratory illness, I had no idea he was sick.

One day, my husband and I were working in the rooster pen. I noticed Mr. Bumni sitting and dozing off. But, it was a warm sunny day and I thought he was just resting. About 15 minutes later, I looked back at him and called his name. He tried to stand, then suddenly collapsed! I rushed him to the vet.

The vet told me his lungs were highly congested. The rooster had no wheezing, sneezing, coughing, gurgling, no symptoms other than his weakness that day.

I pride myself on spending a lot of time caring for my chickens. I thought how did I miss this?

I had planned to breed him, as I felt he had the strongest genetic characteristics. But, nature had other plans.

That just goes to show what we think we know. :idunno
 

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