Broody Hensįemale chickens also have their own term too. It may be proper, but it’d be bizarre to run around on a farm in Missouri saying “cockerel” all the time. The “proper” word for a young male chicken. Not as old as a rooster.Ĭockerel: the same as a cock. Cocks are young males, and the “correct” term for them is “cockerel.”Ĭocks are tolerated by the rooster until they get too big for their breeches and start getting, ahem, cocky, at which time there will have to be a showdown to determine who will rule the roost.Ĭock: a young male chicken that has yet to reach sexual maturity. Cocky CockerelsĪ cock is a male chicken, but he is no rooster. It has rights to all the adult female chickens. I’m not sure how chickens prevent or handle incest, though.Ī rooster is the king of the roost and is incredibly territorial. Rooster: the adult male who rules the roost and has sexual rights over the adult females. However, “roost” is also a verb meaning “to sleep in the roost.” Thus, this versatile word is both a noun and a verb.
“Roost” is also where roosts settle down for the night. Roost (n, v): a group of chickens which, in the wild, would consist of one adult male and several females, their chicks and adolescents. In these conditions, outcast members of the group can be bullied to death. However, many poultry farmers keep all-female batteries, although they run the risk of hierarchical problems in which cliques form and bullying occurs (there’s a reason we say “henpecked”). Well, the chicken equivalent of a harem is a roost, and the chicken equivalent of the sheik is the rooster.Ī rooster is incredibly territorial, waking up early to blast an unsubtle warning to all other potential rivals that this land is his, and he will suffer no adult male visitors (that is why we hear them crowing at daybreak and at various times during the day).Īs you might imagine, roosters aren’t terribly big on feminism and will keep their females in line with a no-nonsense attitude that involves dispensing furious violence on violators of the peace. If you think of a plenipotentiary Middle East ruler such as a sheik, sultan, or emir, I’m sure you have the word “harem” floating around in the back of your mind.Īs commonly espoused in our more fanciful literature, a harem is where a bevy of beauties are locked up in what is essentially a gilded cage for the sole pleasure of the ruler. Roosters are feisty, testosterone-driven, no-nonsense characters who rule their roost with an iron hand, well, claw, I suppose is the right word. “King” of the Roost, aka, “Rooster”Ĭhicken is a non-gendered term that refers to male and female chickens, but “rooster” refers only to male chickens. A hen is a female chicken.Ĭhicks are young chickens. Roosters and cocks are male chickens, but roosters are sexually mature, while cocks are sexually immature. “Chicken”?Ĭhicken refers to a species of bird and any adult member of that species, male or female. What Is The Difference Between “Rooster” vs. It is, therefore, of little surprise that we are unfamiliar with various terms for the bird, words with which any country-living individual would be as familiar as a city-dweller with, er… city stuff. “All they ever see are chicken parts in the freezer or on a plate.”Īs weird as that may seem to anyone who, like me, was brought up in a relatively rural area with plenty of experience of various farm animals and lots of wildlife (I guess a privileged upbringing in its own way), the only experience many folks have of this popular fowl is gastronomic. “Lots of these youngsters have never seen a real-life chicken before,” she explained. Luckily, a zoo staff member stood nearby, watching me as intently as I looked at the exhibit. The obligatory wire fence surrounded it, and inside were some chickens, as confirmed by a sign which said, “Chickens.”įor a minute or two, I tried my darndest to figure out the joke (we all know about British humor, right 🙄), but I didn’t get it. Still, it was many years ago–nearly two decades now–so maybe things have changed.Īnyway, I was at London Zoo and came across a curious pen.
I was somewhat disappointed, as not only was it much like other zoos but, also considerably smaller than I’d imagined.įor some reason, I’d expected great things from a place called “London Zoo,” but nope, not sure the juice was worth the squeeze, as they say. chicken? Many years ago, as I traveled in the land of the Brits, or as you might more commonly know the place, Britain, I visited London Zoo. What is the difference between rooster vs.
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