I originally got Ameraucana's because of the egg colour. Who could resist green/blue eggs? Once I started to raise them...well! The first thing that struck me was how much they resemble predators, with those beards puffing out the sides of their faces. When they face you straight on...totally reminds me of something out of Jurassic Park
. But on the flip side of that coin, when they come racing over to you to get their treats and their beards are swinging free...
they are just too cute for words!
I have had them in my flock since 2009 and can't imagine a bunch of girls without them. They add character to the yard (not that mine really needs much more character LOL) and colour to the carton. I really adore them.
I've read a few posts that people find them unfriendly and aggressive with other birds; I have two different batches of them in my flock right now. The first I got in 2009 and the second in 2011. The girls in 2009 I spend a fair amount of time with as they were my first shipment of chicks. These girls are supremely friendly, very docile, don't run away when I try to touch them they just sort of move out of the way of my hand and then look at me. The girls from the 2011 shipment are more stand-offish. But they will still come running to get treats and only one of them is what I would call aggressive. Interestingly, she got sick last winter and when she got better, it was like she wasn't going to take any more crap from anyone and started to assert herself. She really got picked on a lot when she was ill.
Anyway, I'm babbling here (get used to it folks, it happens a lot
). End story: LOVE my Ameraucana's!