Fighting Roosters

What a gruesome sight to come home to!

Met the boys at the back when we came home from work and found Buffy like this!

I couldn't tell where the cut was, whether it was on his head or on his comb. After cleaning it with just warm water, I couldn't find any injury to his head, so I suspect it was his comb that got cut and it bled A LOT!

Combs have a very good vascular system, which would mean that it would bleed quite a bit when cut.

The cleanup

Now we had to try and work out what happened, it didn't take us long to find the prime suspect...

Arrow pointing to the blood under his beak

Blood on his feathers

They still spent the night together, but I did notice that Buffy did not crow as much in the morning. Generally Penguin starts crowing and Buffy joins in. This morning, it was Penguin crowing most of the time, with Buffy only crowing once or twice.

When I let them out, Buffy was definitely wary of Penguin, and kept his distance, which confirmed that Penguin was the assailant.

Looks like Penguin's hormones are gearing up and he is getting protective of is harem. I was hoping that they would get along together. Although I did see them standing close to each other before I left for work this morning. At 6.5 months of age I don't think they have quite reached sexual maturity, so we may see some attitude changes to them as they grow older

Besides that, Buffy was fine, crowing when he was out in the garden. We just had to clear a bit more of the blood from his right nostril, I noticed that he had a bit of difficulty breathing (each time he took a breath, he opened his beak).

We shall see what tonight will hold...

EDIT: Watched them over the next few days. They seem to be back to their chummy selves. Both happy to hang around each other. Maybe it was just a one off tiff to establish who was boss.