‘Ronaldo’ cavorting around Horohoro

He had a remarkable ability to survive, that chook!

Certainly if he’d been a cat, he would have used up all his lives. And in doing so, he also grew a bit of a media pro le in e Weekend Sun. at surprised people down on the farm. A famous rooster?

‘Ronaldo’ that is. e bothersome rooster from Tauranga’s 14th Avenue. For some he was a shortlived novelty, but to others he was an infuriating 90 decibel invasion of their predawn calm and they wanted him gone, come what may, dead or alive.

so they exchange greetings every morning,” says Karen. And they do it with impunity, the farm day has always started by then, no-one’s lost sleep, no-one’s o ended or upset.

And he’s strutting the chook enclosure, in and out of the hen house with the laying boxes, constantly checking on the girls. Ronaldo is a rooster with purpose these days. And with those new showy sickle feathers fanning in the breeze, it just may end in love.

“Ronaldo’s not exactly a cuddly chook,” says Karen. “Not many roosters are, but he’s always there when I go to feed them.”

Town & country contrast

Undigni ed farmyard behaviour down the digni ed Avenues wasn’t tolerated. ey wanted to reclaim their precious sleep time.

ey wanted to reclaim their

Now Ronaldo is lording it on a farm at Horohoro near Rotorua with his own personal harem of hens. Life and love is good. “Four or ve hens,” says Karen Hunt, Ronaldo’s godsend, his adoptive mum.

“He gets on very well with them.”

Plumage, attitude returns!

And he has a ne, new tail plumage. “He’s looking beautiful.” Beautiful, digni ed and handsome. But of course that wasn’t always the case. Because when he arrived unexpectedly, inexplicably and noisily down the Avenues, a dog bailed him up, tore out his tail feathers. His rooster-hood was gone.

Ronaldo was right on the brink for a while.

“ e bird needed quite a bit of vet treatment, quite a bit of rehab, there were quite a few puncture wounds,” says Kelly Phelps of Free as a Bird, the ex-battery hen rescue service. She brought Ronald back from the brink. “He de nitely had a lucky escape.

“But he’s looking stunning now, a ne-looking bird. His plumage is back.”

As is his attitude. He’s back crowing at 6.30am.

“He’s close to a rooster on a neighbouring property, e Sun bought into the Ronaldo story and people connected. ere were dozens of messages.

Ronaldo’s story also underscores the di erence between town and country. “It’s nice to hear a positive rooster story, but it did surprise some people about all the publicity he attracted.” For townies, it’s a lovely story. But for a farmer, Ronaldo might have been just another rooster. But we don’t want to go there.

“We didn’t want him to stay long in the neighborhood, but we didn’t want to see him come to harm,” wrote one Sun reader. “OMG he’s a beaut,” messaged someone else. He was even o ered sanctuary o shore. “I’d take Ronaldo if he was located near me in the United States. Hope he nds a new, safe, loving, dogless home.”

Mamaku chook-lover Kelly and her Free as a Bird rescue organisation have saved thousands of battery hens from the inevitable over the years. She’s currently clearing a farm of 700 birds, which she has to pay for.

Check out her work at: Freeasabirdrescue.org

It might be premature to suggest this is the nal chapter in the Ronaldo story.