White Leghorn, the forgotten breed

[bargain]

White Leghorns:

I love my white leghorns...The roosters are so proud with their tall comb aright and their posture so perky...Those lean ladies are veritable laying machines...I think some must lay twice a day....They just never stop even in the middle of a freak ice storm in the south!

The babies so yellow and cuddly...The eggs so sumptuous and large....

I love my White leghorns and just wanted to stand up for the forgotten breed.

Anyone else????

 

[gryeyes]

I never wanted white chickens. I never wanted white egg layers. I bought two Lakenvelders from a BYCer downsizing her flock, and they were great layers. Plus, they weren't white chickens. And that white egg really set off the colored ones in the cartons I sold to my few egg customers.

Then I got a Delaware. Mostly white. Great layer, great personality. Not white eggs, which was nice.

And then I got a feather up my butt, so to speak, and decided I wanted to incubate some refrigerated store eggs from Trader Joe's. Fertile eggs. Had to try that experiment. Accomplished it for Mahonri's Annual New Year's Day Hatch.

Four hatched: 3 pullets and a cockerel.

Gosh, they are pretty birds! And because I am brooding them in the bathroom with other chicks, they are growing up pretty friendly. I can hardly wait to add them to the flock.

And yes, I am looking forward to their white eggs.

 

[math ace]

M

I dont know what they are like yet but I wish that I had a hen of this pretty breed.We thought that we would get a hen but......now it is a rooster.

but on the bright side my mom does not want a rooster but I will try to get her to keep him,becase he was my first chicken.But many chickens will die so i should get used to having new chickens all the time.

Perhaps you should do some more research on chicken husbandry. Most chickens will die due to ignorance of the caregiver. If proper precautions are taken against predators, if sanitation practices are followed, and if routine preventative health care is provided, you should not lose too many chickens.

By the time you invest in a few bags of feed, the chickens will no longer seem like a "disposable" item to your mother.

 

[BayBay Peepers]

Here's my Buff Orp x White Leghorn roo baby in his first snow.


And the three misbehaving musketeers

 

[kacklinghen]

 

[nicalandia]

Quote:
We can all thanks Leghorns, because of them we are having to eat white eggs at a good price. I don't know how much the price of eggs could go up if we only had silkies...

 

[cubakid]

Brown eggs  would be just  as  lame  and tasteless  as white eggs   if  the chickens  would be  kept in cages  and fed  sh*t like supermarket eggs are.

My mother works for a very large egg company here in CA. This business also has a couple feed stores as well as their own feed mill that they use to sell feed and feed the birds on thier own ranches. I buy and feed the same feed that they feed those hens. It's not bad feed. I show chickens that eat the same thing. It's quality feed, and chickens have to have the same necessities as another breed( excepting ornamental gluten free Chinese birds) just because they mass produce the birds to fill the barns and there are so many doesn't mean they feed them sh*t. They just probably get the same feed as you for a low mass purchase price.

 

[ve]

ACV- Apple Cider Vinegar

Your dirty Leghorns, staying with face to the food dish, being lazy sounds like Broilers to me, or very sick Leghorns, but I do not think my second gues is the case.

 

[NestingHillsSC]

North Georgia what you are describing are Cornish x Rocks, not sure if that is what you have or not. I bought my first baby chicks March 11th this year with 6 leghorns (later going back and getting 12 more a month later) and 2 Cornish X Rocks along with other breeds at Tractor Supply. My Leghorns from day one could fly out of the brooder, and when first introduced to the chicken run they flew out of that too. I can not imagine this breed being lazy and dirty. Even after a dirt bath they come out as white as a north Canadian snow fall. The Cornish X Rocks always look dirty, laying in a pile of their own poo near a feeder. They will get out and scratch though, or attempt it.

I have a question about leghorns for those with experience, how flighty will they get with or without clipping wings, I raised my fence to 6 feet tall, will they be able to fly out of the run still? I am hoping I can keep from clipping their wings because I just adore how they fly around in the run. When other chickens walk they will fly from end to end of the run. I also wonder when they will they will start laying eggs.

I have had them start laying any where from 5-6 months old. If they want out they will get out. Mine are 5 weeks old only and when I came home yesterday from the flee market 2 of them where out. And the grow pen fence is over 4ft tall. 6ft fence is good as long is there is nothing they can jump on and fly over. Hen house etc etc. They are very flighty. Small body large wings=flighty. LOL

 

[cubakid]

No. If they are broken you have to wait till they molt.