Not all animal advocates are cheering for Santa Barbara County’s newest rooster restrictions (“Rooster rules,” Jan. 25). In fact, a good number of us—particularly those of us who run hands-on rescues and animal sanctuaries—vehemently oppose rooster bans and restrictions.
These sweeping rooster restrictions—touted as an anti-cockfighting measure—promise to hurt more animals than they could ever help. By failing to distinguish between the game fowl used in cockfighting and the hundreds of different rooster breeds kept as pets, they condemn scores of backyard roosters to death and shift an undue burden onto the handful of rescue organizations in the state that accept roosters.
Another faulty assumption of rooster-ban proponents is thinking that most backyard roosters are intentional acquisitions and thus easily avoided by sensible citizens. But the scores of unwanted, backyard-breed roosters looking for homes are, for the most part, entirely unintentional—an artifact of the backyard-egg trend. Because of the high error rate (minus 20 percent) in sexing chicks, it’s almost inevitable that people purchasing a brood of future egg-layers will discover a mislabeled male in the mix. These “oops” roosters are the source of virtually all those vying for sanctuary spaces.
This situation happens with such predictability that most hapless rooster rehomers must soon confront the realization that a suitable home at a “farm in the country” is simply a fable. The fact is, the number of farmsteads willing to take in a rooster as a pet is basically nil, and all farmed animal sanctuaries are beyond full, easily receiving more relinquishment requests for roosters than for any other animal.
So where do these unwanted roosters wind up? Many are euthanized in overcrowded shelters that are too preoccupied with the endless stream of needy dogs and cats to suss out a safe spot for a rooster. Many others are dumped on the roadside, where they quickly fall victim to predators, starvation, or exposure to the elements. Untold others may meet an equally grim farm-animal fate of being “dispatched” behind the shed.
Meanwhile, there are no statistics showing that banning roosters is effective in reducing cockfighting activity. Even if there were, so what? Just as we would not seek bans and restrictions on all dogs because some people like to use some breeds for dogfighting, neither should we punish all roosters because some people may be abusing some breeds for cockfighting.
With the already pressing need for safe, no-kill rooster homes, the last thing these beleaguered birds need is yet more restrictions. The fight to end cockfighting should not leave the rest of the state’s roosters fighting for their lives.
Ariana Huemer
director, Hen Harbor
Felton
This article appears in Feb 8-18, 2024.
100% agree with this! It is not going to stop the cockfighting, all it is going to do is make the existing rooster dumping animal welfare problem worse. Perhaps the county should invest in research first. If they did, they’d realize that the number of homes which keep multiple roosters are mainly backyard chicken keepers AND that there is an abundant welfare concern which is continuously ignored.
Cockfighters need heftier charges for when they are caught. A slap on the wrist and minimal fine does nothing to stop it from happening again. In fact, a shelter in CA admitted that the same person gets caught with fighting birds every couple of years and the process keeps repeating. It’s because there are no legitimate consequences.
I run Adopt a Bird Network, a non profit which helps birds find homes across the country. CA and CO are the worst states and it’s because of the laws which ban roosters. Passing this is good to make CA surpass CO in worst states.
Banning roosters to stop cockfighting is kind of absurd since cockfighters aren’t exactly worried about lawfulness. Prohibition doesn’t often work out. When alcohol was outlawed, organized crime exploded. Outlawing roosters will lead to an already illicit activity being much more profitable for cockfighters since illegal activity has much higher costs associated with the risk and the smaller population of people willing to take that risk commanding higher fees for venues and underground chicken care and paying people to look the other way and everything else associated with pushing an already illegal activity into deeper illegality
I’m not sure what animal welfare groups are getting paid to back anti cockfighting laws that are ineffective and have no motive in actual animal welfare. By promoting rooster bans they are merely punishing animals and have made no progress in stopping cockfighting. Want to stop cockers? Make better laws to punish cockfighting.
Instead, these laws make criminals out of people who want to be able to keep their pet roosters, and burden the rescues who have too little space and funding to care for all of the roosters whose owners now face a choice to become law breakers or animal abandoners.
As a sanctuary director who receives over 3000 requests for rooster surrenders per year, most of whom are only wanting to relinquish due to rooster bans, I hope this decision can be reversed.
Exactly, and unfortunately, the groups pushing for rooster bans are just looking for a win. It comes at a high cost. Rooster restrictions will have no impact on cockfighting numbers whatsoever but it will make the groups pushing the bans look good. It will also harm the roosters. Half of all chicks hatched are male and even if theyre sexed at the hatchery, still 10-20% of those chicks will still be male. What is supposed to happen to them?
People who raise roosters for fighting will still find a way to do what they want to do. It may be inconvenient but it wont stop or reduce the numbers. What might help roosters (if this is in fact actually about caring about roosters) is for only people who are zoned to have roosters to be permitted to have chickens at all. Feed stores and hatcheries should be required to check a permit of sorts from customers that states theyre legally allowed to have roosters because theres almost a guarantee those feed stores are selling thousands of male chicks to people who are not zoned for it.
Maybe Im off track and this is just about stopping cockfighting because its illegal, but isnt it also illegal to toss unwanted roosters on roadsides because the feed store legally sold a male chick to someone who cannot have roosters.
I don’t understand why animal welfare groups would be so mean to our pet rooster friends. This makes me sad. Roosters make great companion friends.
HSUS have it all wrong. Roosters aren’t the problem. Animal abusers are the problem. Many sanctuaries do the hard work of rescuing and rehabilitating roosters while HSUS executives pay themselves salaries to do zilch for the animals.
I don’t understand why anyone thought rooster bans would magically stop cockfighting. All it does is make it harder for normal law abiding people to adopt roosters, and exacerbate the homeless & overpopulation problems. Just look at how LA’s rooster ban is working ou – animal shelters bursting at seams, roosters being dumped are now a regular thing.
Consider All The Consequences
While it is absolutely necessary to crack down harder on animal cruelty and cockfighting, it should not be done at the expanse of pet roosters. The inability to differentiate between yards holding roosters for cockfighting and those that have pet chickens and roosters is going to do an enormous amount of harm.
I have myself taken in many chickens and abandoned roosters from rescue organizations because the amount of birds, especially roosters, looking for a home to avoid euthanasia is enormous.
In my opinion this topic needs a more sensible and multi-faceted approach to not do more harm than good for roosters. Because a few people have cruel and ill intentions and should be punished for that, we should not instate blanket ordinances that are more detrimental than helpful to the animals.
While not popular with everyone, roosters are a food source. We are a multicultural society and there are those who would appreciate the extra food supply of fresh meat. When I have extra roosters, I gift them to a local Mexican family who butcher and use the meat for their family. Mixtec families have been recipients of my extra roosters, as well. Why hasn’t anyone thought of a humane way to make these birds available to those in need? Homesteading has become more popular and mainstream in recent years. Growing crops and raising animals for food isn’t a new idea. Let’s put on our thinking caps and think outside the box. “Haste makes Waste” and the decision to ban and limit roosters was made without examining all the options.