Chicken Breed Focus - Faverolles

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sumi

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The Faverolles is a French breed of chicken, developed in the 1860s near the village Faverolles from whence it took its name. Faverolles are known to have quiet and docile temperaments. Their good nature makes them an excellent choice for the backyard flock owner and they are popular as pets for children. Their excellent temperament combined with their production capabilities, has also seen them becoming popular with small flock owners looking for a gentle dual purpose breed. Their gentle nature does make them prone to being bullied by aggressive breeds though and they do best in flocks with other quiet breeds of similar temperaments. The males are said to make extremely quiet roosters.

They are quite unusual in appearance in that they have five toes and feathered shanks, as well as being heavily bearded and muffed, and their most popular color Salmon, is a color pattern which is exclusive to the Faverolles. Salmon colored birds have the females appearing a lightly colored pinkish wheaten and white, compared to the males which are a striking combination of black, gold and straw color, both have slate colored underfluff.

Many different breeds were used in developing the Faverolles, including the Houdan, Brahma and Dorking. They were originally bred to be a dual purpose production breed, and it is still fairly early maturing, quite winter hardy, an excellent table bird and the hens are good layers of large tinted eggs, especially in the winter. In the early 1900’s Faverolles were producing most of the eggs for the Paris, France market.

The Favorolles was imported into the US in the early 1900’s and is a very popular show bird today, both in standard and bantam sizes. They come in a number of colors, including the best known Salmon, White, Buff, Cuckoo and Blue among others.

It was recognized by the APA in 1914.
It is on The Livestock Conservancy's Threatened list.


Details:
Breed purpose: Dual Purpose.
Comb Type: Single.
Broodiness: Average, good mothers.
Climate Tolerance: Hardy, cold tolerant.
Weight: 8 lbs roosters, 6 lbs hens
Egg Productivity: Good / 160+ eggs year.
Egg Size: Large
Egg Color: Tinted


BYC Breed reviews:


https://www.backyardchickens.com/products/faverolles

General breed discussions & FAQ thread:

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/268082/faverolles-thread/0_20

A Pictures & Stories Of My chickens thread about a special Faverolles:

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/563302/derperella-the-weird-faverolles-friends/0_20



Favorelles hen, picture @appps



Favorelles Rooster & Hen, picture @jimnjay



Favorelles hens, picture @hcammack



Favorelles rooster, picture @comerspoultry



Favorelles rooster, picture @pfmerlin



Favorelles rooster, picture @pfmerlin


Favorelles Chicks, picture @Cloverleaf Farm


Do you own Favorelles? Are you a Favorelles breeder? If so, please reply to this thread with the your thoughts and experiences, including:

· What made you decide to get this breed?
· Do you own them for fun? Breeding? Some other purpose?
· What are your favorite characteristics about this breed?
· Post some pics of your birds; male/female, chicks, eggs, etc!

We have a bunch of other awesome breed-focus threads for you to enjoy. You can see all of them here: https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/chicken-breed-focus-project.975504/
 
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I am a newbie to keeping chickens and have a backyard flock of 7. I ordered 5 salmon faverolles this spring. As chicks they were the only breed I ordered that got pasty butt. I had to check and clean their little bottoms twice a day. And between 2 and 3 weeks they all turned into screaming mimi's everytime I picked them up. I had planned to keep 2 because of their docile descriptions (and I love the muffs and feathered feet) but ended up selling off 4 and keeping an extra Columbian Wyandotte instead. The one I kept is still a screamer at 11 1/2 weeks. But now that she is feathered out she is also a flapper as she screams. She doesn't peck or nip and, in fact, always wants to be close to me. She'll even hop up on the garden swing to sit beside me and swing and lay in my lap. JUST DON'T LAY A HAND ON HER!!!!!!!! or she is screaming and running. I sure hope she mellows out with age. I am sure to hold and stroke her everyday to try and get her use to being handled.

I love her bright yellow eyes but she's gotten a lot of black feathers in her beard and muff. A huge disappointment as all the pictures I see of salmon hens have beautifully colored cream/ white beards. Maybe that's the difference between buying from mail order hatcheries verses a show breeder?

Rosie Fluffybottom at approx. 10 weeks old


her black coming in
 
I love my Faverolles. I think they are a very quirky, strange chicken, but they are so sweet. Faverolles waddle when they walk due to their fluffy feathers and fifth toe. They are very docile chickens. They have feathered legs, a beard, and muffs. My Fav, Babs, went broody occasionally and made a great mother to some chicks I slipped under her when she was broody one night. When I checked on her in the morning, she had brought the chicks out in the run and was teaching them how to scratch and eat. She gathered them under her wings and protected them from the other chickens (and me). Babs was very talkative, I'm not sure if this is a Faverolle thing or just her thing. Sadly, I lost Babs (and most of my other chickens) to a raccoon this spring, so I had to have another Faverolle. I got new chicks and made sure that I had another Faverolle in with the order.
 
My Finicky Finas/Faverolles are my favorite group of ladies. They are a riot when they get ahold of grapes and have a soft honkish voice. My boy was anything but quiet, but very gentle and escorted me everywhere. Unfortunately my neighbor didn't like his serenades
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I love Favorelles! We use to have one, but coccidiosis hit our flock before we knew what it was and took her life. (We cured the rest now)
I'd say, very nice chickens to have around - but she kept to herself a lot and stayed away from the rest, except for at night when she had to go in the coop with them.
 
I have four salmon faverolles and they are not pure I'm sure they have a lot more wheat streaks than the one in the pic above but they have five toes and the beard and feathered legs. So sweat! So cute and they always want to follow me around. Loud though. They need to be entertained. I have them in an enclosed area that is large enough for four birds. I don't want them running around the whole yard pooping on everything :/ haha but they squeak loudly at times and I get nervous when it's early in the morning because of my neighbors scratch and meal wins keep them happy love this breed
 

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