As a very green, inexperienced Polish Chicken (or any chicken) owner, I hoped to find someone's photographic progression of their chicks to help me determine sex or at least more accurately guess their sex as they developed.
We got 3 Polish chicks that were approximately 3-4 weeks old, with one being likely one week younger than the other two. We are not allowed to have Roosters in our area, so hoped they would all be Hens. Statistically though, the odds were against us getting 3/3 hens, and we knew we would almost certainly end up with at least one or two roosters from the bunch. There was only a 1/8 chance that all three would be the same sex (whether female or male).
And wouldn't you know it? They are all little dudes.
Several facebook groups and forums on this site resulted in close to 100% of people saying all three were cockerels (based on the last photo on this article and others taken the same day) and then that day we heard and saw them crow.
So I wanted to share pictures of their progression. Unfortunately, only one little man (formerly known as Sansa, but renamed to Stannis for the short time he will remain with us before he goes to a new home) was photogenic and not camera-shy. He was the bravest of the bunch from the get go, and I even trained him to jump a little off the ground on command (in exchange for a mealworm).
The above photo is little Sansa/Stannis shortly after we got him from the Ranch.
The ugly stage... The chick on the right is Sansa/Stannis, with his buddy Cookie on the left and little Odette/Odie's fluff butt on far left.
Feathers coming in nicely. Possible waddle and comb growth at this point?
Definite waddles, though that doesn't confirm that it is a cockerel at this stage.
Other Polish Chicken owners saw this picture and exclaimed that he is "definitely a cockerel."
We got 3 Polish chicks that were approximately 3-4 weeks old, with one being likely one week younger than the other two. We are not allowed to have Roosters in our area, so hoped they would all be Hens. Statistically though, the odds were against us getting 3/3 hens, and we knew we would almost certainly end up with at least one or two roosters from the bunch. There was only a 1/8 chance that all three would be the same sex (whether female or male).
And wouldn't you know it? They are all little dudes.
Several facebook groups and forums on this site resulted in close to 100% of people saying all three were cockerels (based on the last photo on this article and others taken the same day) and then that day we heard and saw them crow.
So I wanted to share pictures of their progression. Unfortunately, only one little man (formerly known as Sansa, but renamed to Stannis for the short time he will remain with us before he goes to a new home) was photogenic and not camera-shy. He was the bravest of the bunch from the get go, and I even trained him to jump a little off the ground on command (in exchange for a mealworm).
The above photo is little Sansa/Stannis shortly after we got him from the Ranch.
The ugly stage... The chick on the right is Sansa/Stannis, with his buddy Cookie on the left and little Odette/Odie's fluff butt on far left.
Feathers coming in nicely. Possible waddle and comb growth at this point?
Definite waddles, though that doesn't confirm that it is a cockerel at this stage.
