Most Aggressive Chicken Breeds – Not Recommended For First-Time Owners

While most domestic chickens have had aggression bred out of them, there are still some breeds that retain some of their aggressive traits. They aren’t going to be as intense as they would be in wild birds, but they are there. This is why we figured we would go through the most aggressive chicken breeds out there.

These are the breeds that tend to be a little less friendly than others. Some of them are aggressive chicken breeds in general, the others commonly have aggressive individuals.

Top 8 Aggressive Chicken Breeds

These are the top 8 most aggressive chicken breeds:

• Asil
• Buckeye
• Cornish
• Faverolles
• Sumatra
• Wyandotte
• Cubalaya
• Modern Game
• Old English Game

The order of these chickens on this list goes from mildly aggressive, to quite aggressive. So, the lower down this list, the more aggressive the chicken could potentially be.

Asil

The Asil chicken sometimes referred to as the Aseel chicken, is a breed of chicken that comes from India.

They are heavy birds that are fantastic for meat purposes.

The problem is that they are not a standardized breed. There are several dozen birds that could come under the Asil breed, and each has its own traits.

Some of them can be quite aggressive chickens. While there has been a degree of standardization in the United States, you still have no idea which bird you are going to end up with.

Buckeye

The Buckeye chicken is unique so far. All of the other breeds were developed with cockfighting in mind, or at least originated from cockfighting breeds.

Not the Buckeye Chicken. This breed was always intended to be a productive chicken breed for meat and eggs.

Therefore, it is surprising that it is such an aggressive chicken breed. It probably just has genes in it from one of the birds it was bred from that are tough to get rid of.

Due to the aggressive nature of this chicken breed, it was never really taken up by commercial farming operations.

As a result, it is in danger of dying out in the United States.

Cornish

Oddly, the Cornish chicken originates from Cornwall in England. However, it is not called the Cornish chicken there. It is called the Indian Game.

Once again, this is a chicken that was designed for cockfighting. However, it never really saw a major amount of success there.

Instead, it became a broiler chicken. This means that it is a chicken breed that grows exceedingly fast with the intention of being eaten.

It is not productive as an egg-laying chicken, laying just a couple of eggs per week if you are lucky.

Because the main focus was on creating a fast-growing chicken, none of the original aggressive genes were bred out of the Cornish.

Faverolles

The Faverolles Chicken is a French-British chicken. As far as we can tell, this is a breed that was never raised for cockfighting. It has always been a chicken developed for meat and egg purposes.

However, nowadays, it seems to be used mostly for show.

Therefore, it is quite surprising that is an aggressive chicken breed. By all accounts, the Faverolles can be quite a territorial chicken, and if you enter its space, it won’t be a fan.

It is mostly the roosters that seem to be aggressive, though.

Therefore, if you do not keep multiple males together, then you should be fine. If you do, well, this is a breed that has been known to fight to the death for space.

Sumatra

Once again, the Sumatra chicken is a cockfighting chicken and that is all it was ever developed for.

Of course, since cockfighting was banned in most countries, it isn’t used for that now. It has been repurposed into a show chicken.

However, not a whole lot about the breed has changed from the cockfighting days.

This means that the Sumatra chicken remains one of the most aggressive chicken breeds in the world.

Since it does not have much use in the way of eggs or meat, you probably wouldn’t want to be raising this anyway. It serves no purpose outside of a show environment.

Wyandotte

The Wyandotte chicken is a breed that was built to be dual-purpose.

This means that you can raise it for the eggs, but it will often be destined for the slaughter once egg production starts to fall off.

This is a rather large chicken, so one of them could easily feed a family.

In terms of egg production, it isn’t necessarily going to be the highest that you have ever seen in a chicken. However, the Wyandotte hen is able to pump out a rather respectful 4-eggs per week.

In general this is not an aggressive chicken breed, but they commonly have aggressive roosters.

Cubalaya

The Cubalaya chicken was originally bred for cockfighting. So, of course, this is one of those chickens that was literally bred to be aggressive.

While it is no longer used for cockfighting all that much (outside a few countries), the Cubalaya chicken still has those aggressive genes in it.

It is a great shame, really. This is a chicken that looks beautiful and produces a decent number of eggs and meat.

While it is not as aggressive as some of the other chickens on this list, you probably should be wary of it.

Modern Game

The Modern Game is sort-of an old cockfighting chicken. This breed was never actually used for cockfighting.

It was bred from those chickens, though. This is because the old cockfighting chicken breeders needed a new type of chicken to raise after cockfighting was banned.

While the Modern Game has now lost a few of those more aggressive genes as a result, it is still a breed that can be quite territorial at times. This means that roosters will never go well with other roosters.

Old English Game

Let’s wrap up this list with one of the most aggressive chicken breeds. The Old English Game chicken an old cockfighting chicken.

In fact, the Old English Game was actually used to create the Modern Game.

To be honest, if you are raising chickens for meat or eggs, then steer clear of the Old Engish Game. It is not effective at any of those.

Instead, this is a breed that is mostly for show.

So, only buy if you are using it for a show, otherwise, you will end up with a pretty-looking chicken that doesn’t do much other than often getting aggressive.

Aggressive Chicken Breeds Final Thoughts

Remember; these chickens can be aggressive. It is not a definitive list to aggressive chickens breeds, though.

Now, we are not saying that you shouldn’t raise any of these chickens. They are all fantastic breeds of chicken.

However, they are probably not going to be good for first-time chicken owners. They can be tough to manage.

Even the friendliest chicken breeds sometimes can have aggressive individuals and can be aggressive in the right situation.

The thing is, don’t just jump into owning a chicken unless you know about the breed. This way, you will know how to deal with any of their aggressive traits.