Topic of the Week - How long do chickens live?

[OlandskMama]

Rachel,
My long lived birds were bullet proof RIR , Black Australorps and the one Barred Rock. I now raise Olandsk Dwarf chickens and they are a challenge to keep healthy. It is heart breaking when they don't thrive. I never medicated chickens in the past but I swear their medicine cabinet is bigger than mine!
It is worth the effort though, to be a part the effort to keep a rare breed from going extinct. You are doing a good thing!

 

[everyonesmomtwo]

she is the last of my batan hens. All my other girls are the big black hens.

 

[Sylvester017]

Don't know why, but none of my chucks has lived beyond 5 years. They are free range, so that might have something to do with it. Who can tell what they eat? Plus they pick up stuff off the wild birds. Plus they are rare breeds. I worm them regularly and medicate as soon as I see something is wrong.

Could be so many reasons why -- we found the purebred Ameraucana breed too delicate for us. We've had 3 and only one survived to age 3. Beautiful sweet breed but they don't do well in our humid SoCal climate. Also, talked with a breeder who found her processed Ameraucana cockerel organs much fattier than her other breeds - we were thinking they had a proclivity for fattiness and guessed that's why they did better in cooler climates than our hotter areas. I started backyard chickens 51/2 yrs ago and my Silkie of the same age is still around -- but she is slowing down a bit. I live in an area with a humid climate, rare rainfall, and horrible city air. My girls get to free-range all day and have organic feed, varied fresh produce, vitamin supplementation, health maintenance regimen, and a vet for problems I can't identify, but in spite of all this quality care I know our city life is not the best for man or beast.

 

[chicksunderwing]

Cassia is 7 and the sole remaining chicken from our first flock. She's in great shape and lays as often as the 5-yr-olds.

I think somebody asked about her. She was given to us with several other chicks and we were told they were Aeraucanas. ? This hen laid the very first egg we ever had -- it was a light blue-green. Then she out-lived all her "siblings" and still lays; but at 7, her eggs are light gray now. Cassia is also the only one out of our 22 that has always jumped on our backs! What's an Easter Egger?

 

[Sylvester017]

I think somebody asked about her. She was given to us with several other chicks and we were told they were Aeraucanas. ? This hen laid the very first egg we ever had -- it was a light blue-green. Then she out-lived all her "siblings" and still lays; but at 7, her eggs are light gray now. Cassia is also the only one out of our 22 that has always jumped on our backs! What's an Easter Egger?

An Easter Egger or EE is what the purebred Ameraucana originally was created from. Even today any purebred Ameraucana that doesn't breed true to standard at least 50% of the time or lay blue-green eggs will be classified back to Easter Egger again. There are some nice articles explaining it all on the Ameraucana club websites. Ameraucana and EE have tails. An Araucana should have no tail and also lays blue-green. Since your Cassia has a tail she can't be an Araucana and since her coloring does not meet one of the "8" approved color variety of Ameraucana she would therefore be an Easter Egger regardless of the color of eggs she lays. EEs will lay any color of blue, blue-green, sage, mint, pink, tinted, tan, stone (gray), or even white eggs. If a so-called purebred Ameraucana happened to lay eggs other than blue or bluish green she would be categorized as EE. But EEs are allowed to lay any color egg.
A couple fun websites to read - click on "history" to get a detailed reference of where they came from:

http://ameraucanaclub.org/faq.html
http://ameraucanaalliance.org/

 

[rachel9947]

Dear OlandskMama,
You're doing a good thing too! I know what you mean about the medicine cabinet! Cupboard full of tonic, antibiotics, syringes, worming powder, scaly leg spray, Poultry Shield, Diatom Earth Powder, etc. Much more stuff than for the cats!
All pretty low at the moment as in moult. Makes them bad-tempered and listless. Also can't fly up so I have to lift them onto perches. Fortunately, I handle all my birds regularly so they are fine about being lifted up. Rare breeds are more trouble, but like you say, thoroughly worthwhile.

 

[Irishluck628]

Sorry I'm kind of reviving an old post, but just wanted to share this! 10 years ago we were given a small flock of random chicken breeds from our neighbor. A few were babies but most were 3-4 years old. My daughter fell in love with the 2 black cochin hens. She showed them for years and always placed well. When Einstein (one of the cochin hens) turned 10, I tried to convince my daughter not to show her. I said she's too old, she won't show well.... I ate my words when that old girl won best in show overall poultry! Einstein is now about 14 years old and has now out lived her sister and daughter, and guess who is at the fair right now waiting to strut her stuff for the judges in the morning!

 

[Sylvester017]

Hurray for Einstein and your daughter! My two oldest Silkies are 6 and 6-1/2 yrs old and so far have outlasted any other breeds in the yard. The bantams have an incredibly healthy lifespan. They just aren't too good about laying after 5 yrs but still great broodies and bug catchers!

 

[Clubber1234]

Most hens stay alive for 15 years.

 

[Mrs. K]

I worry that post like these will give new people an unrealistic goal, and they will feel bad and guilty if their birds don't live for years.

However, I too, must admit, I have never come even close to some of these age spans, my oldest bird ever was 4.5 years when a dang coon got her, but she was seriously showing her age. I would not have expected her to live much longer.

I think another question that would be interesting to correlate with this, is what climate do these old birds live in, and if you have chickens with more winter, does that reduce their life span.

Mrs K