Leghorn

My Leghorns are the best egg layers I have! They rarely miss a day, nice white eggs! They seem to think everything is food and are not super friendly. They do not run off or act crazy when you pick them up, they just do not really like it much.

I have raised these amazing birds for over 4 years, and am in love with them, I can not stand even thinking about not having any.
After touring many breeds, I finally found ones that I was in love with, in fact, I nearly flipped out when I almost did not win my first pair.
After a bit of looking at the variates I settled on the Standard Single Comb Buff variety, and bought a small flock of them.
After 3+ years with my buffs, I have finally gotten a great show quality bird, and I will always recommend them to anyone wanting to raise good, fun, good egg laying chickens.

I started with 2 Brown Leghorns from MM. Both were healthy, one was much more adventurous than the other. Eventually the one that liked to wander off just never came back! The other one has turned into my most stable and one of my most productive layers. My leghorn is a born forager and will spend the entire day scratching and eating excepting a short siesta in the mid-day sun. She visits the feeder far less than most of my other hens. She also has laid right through the winter (with artificial light.) I think a smart person would have a flock of leghorns for egg production and get the Rangers or Cornish X's for meat. I have not experienced any serious frost-bite issues with my leghorns, although leghorn roosters might be a little more susceptible. Great bird for Lg White eggs.

I got my three white leghorns as day old chicks. I hand raised them and tried to interact with them a lot knowing that they are a flighty breed. Well they are still extremely flighty, my handling didn't help. This past winter my three other red chickens went through their molt and the leghorns decided they wanted to basically eat one of the reds. Every day they would pick a bare spot on her back and make her bleed, which would then make everyone go crazy at the sight of blood. Also lately i don't know why one leghorn has decided to mount all the others like she is mating... could be from my lack of a rooster. But the one thing I do love about them is that I get a ton of eggs (2-3 everyday from just them), and they have a good feed conversion to make up for my other hens who don't.

Great birds for pets, they lay big white eggs sometimes twice a day, great bird to compete with in a show. If you want big eggs, these are the birds to get.

I love Leghorns!! I currently sell eggs as a business and Leghorns lay the most eggs, nonstop. They are noisy, but I do not care very much.
My leghorn is also very kind to the other hens- she never is mean to them and she is the only chicken in my flock that everyone of my chickens gets along with her.
She eats a lot, which is probably a con, but she lays such big eggs that it seems like she would eat a ton!!
They are fun,fun,fun!

I highly recommend Leghorns if you want a chicken that lays a lot of huge eggs!

I absolutely adore the Leghorns, they are full of personality, very placid and curious and lay a perfect white egg almost every day! Mine has never had disease or shown any sign of weakness unlike some of my other hens, it's a really tough bird. Leghorns are very easily tamed and ours is a bit like a pet dog sometimes. They can be aggressive to some of my smaller hens and do want to dominate the flock but they make up for it in their friendliness and daily eggs. I would love to get some more sometime!

Love my leghorns...stupid way to start this really as I love all my chooks !!! I got them originally as 'someone' told me they were tasty to eat and I was looking for a dual purpose bird, lesson learned, they have zero meat on them and no matter what I feed them they stay lean. However they are egg laying machines, constant supply of huge white eggs that does drop off in the winter a bit but still impressive layers. I have 4 hens, no rooster and only one went broody for a few weeks, she was easy to 'put off' the brood.

I'm in Queensland and we've recently had a few 40degree days and they coped very well, better then my other chooks and I lost a couple to heat stroke, they sat still in the shade, drank lots of water and spread their wings out instinctively.Even with wings clipped they will fly up and out of the way of snakes, moving sticks or large bugs, in fact anything that might remotely be a threat. They will sound an alarm and run for cover if anything bigger than a crow flys overhead. If our local python (not big enough to take on a leghorn meal yet thankfully, he likes the mice) visits they will roost in the nearby trees if they feel like it or they will see him off.

They are not stupid just too curious for their own good, mine are pretty tame and if they escape the run (the run is huge, free range sized and fenced like fort knocks) they will immediately find the first bit of trouble they can get into because as they are also very hypo active. They know when they are in trouble (this is how I know they are not stupid) and I won't get within 10 meters of them however they are easily bribed with meal worms, bread and sunflower seeds and will race each other from 10 meters away to get the 1st mouthful.....best way to get them back in the pen is to leave a trail of treats leading back into security. They are fast, big and curious. Haven't got a rooster so can't comment on them but if you want good looking, tamable, large egg laying machines that can look after themselves in a semi-free range situation then I think they are great.

I wouldn't recommend them for kids, they are too big, fast and not very placid, or for beginners for the same reasons.

I have one White Leghorn hen. Growing up around RIR's and Barred Rocks, she's a welcome little breath of fresh air. She's young, just over 6 months old and has laid an egg a day for me for the past 2 weeks. I am amazed with her so far. She's a tiny little thing compared to my Orpingtons and EE's. But she's been laying consistently medium sized eggs since day 3. Where they, though the same age, have not started yet. For the amount of room she takes up and the amount of food she eats compared to her egg production even after only 2 weeks of seeing her in action, if this continues, she may be my favorite chicken.
I've heard people complain about Leghorns being flighty but I don't find this to be the case. Possibly because she's in a mixed flock with Orpingtons, EE's, etc. She's not flighty at all. I can walk right up to her and pick her up and she's content to sit snuggled in my arms till I put her back down. I dunno, maybe those flighty birds people talk about are setting each other off and making each other antsy. Maybe they don't do well temperament wise with their own company?
She's bright, curious, and entertaining. Always the first on a new chair, ladder, wheelbarrow, bucket, etc. left unattended in the yard. She's out foraging around with the rest and finds all kinds of good things to eat in the yard.
The only downside to this chicken I have found is her color. White gets dirty and stays that way. When we got her at about 4 months old she had a big stain across her one wing. My daughter kept arguing with me that she wasn't a purebred White Leghorn because she had a big brown spot. I kept telling her it was dirt and would wear or wash off. Weeks later, the stain was still there and finally came out after she shed those feathers. Recently again she got up against something and has splatters of I don't want to think what across her breast. But, hey, with how wonderful she is all around, she can get dirty any time she wants. I love this chicken and am seriously thinking about getting a couple more if I can find some good ones somewhere this spring.

PIcture of her from the day we brought her home with her Sebright friends.


From early Sept. trying to figure out how to open the lid of the food bin. If you look you can see the brown stain still on her flight feathers on that side.

Princess of the compost pile. Sept. 22nd


Dismantling a dirt pile. Who could resist all those fresh bugs and worms!


And finally checking out the top of the retaining wall just this past week. A good bit bigger than her Sebright "sisters" but still the smallest full sized hen in my flock. Big things come in small packages.

I have two White Leghorns. They are really great birds. I get an egg from them 13 out of 14 days. They are both very sweet, and love to sit on my back and shoulders whenever they get the chance. I was told not to get them by many people because they are flighty, but I haven't had any problems with that. Sometimes they can be a little jumpy and skittish, but overall very sweet.

I'm only reviewing the white Leghorn here. The other colors are not the same.

This is not a bird for those that like to cuddle. But for those that want eggs, eggs, and more eggs, the white Leghorn is about perfect. She's a slender, lovely, active bird, and will lay 6-7 eggs a week all year long. She won't want you to touch her, but she'll make more eggs per pound of feed than any other bird out there and she'll stand crowding better than other breeds. Great bird.

Leghorns are an okay breed. I think they were more made for production for a large business then for backyard birds. These breed is NOT for beginners. My Leghorn is blind in one eye, has had prolapse, and goes through really bad molts. Over all I would not recommend them.

I had one white, 2 brown and 2 silver leghorn hens. They were all excellent layers, even during winter when the daylight hours dropped to around 8 hours of good light per day, they didn't slow down. In my little group I found the white one to be the least friendly, she was very skittish and hated being handled by us. The brown ones were friendlier and would come up to me for treats and petting. The silver ones were skittish, but not overly unfriendly. Once we got hold of them they were o.k. with being handled, though I could tell they'd much rather be put down again. In future, if I get to choose, I'd stick with brown leghorns only. They are beautiful birds and much more fun to have around than the others IMO.

I had these hens and boy were they were ridiculous. My brown Leghorns are much smarter than them and get out of stuck situations. My white ones kept getting stuck under things and they sat just where they were. One of them kept biting, not matter how I tried to break her of the habit she would bite even if she was off eggs. I also had one that kept falling over as if she had a broken wing, but she didn't. One got stuck underneath something after she laid an egg, and she was going to suffocate had I not come out in time but she had already lost a bunch of air. My family agreed not to buy anymore of these hens. I prefer the brown ones, they are much better.

I have had to extricate them from some of the most ridiculous situations. Today, one trapped himself under a bag of feed and the wall. While other chickens would wiggle out, the Leghorns stay precisely where they are stuck. I've lost at least two from this "deer in headlights" type behavior. I routinely find my free ranging Leghorn roosters caught between things, with their wings stuck under something inexplicably or about to snap their own necks. My Browns and Sex-links free range in the same fashion, yet have never gotten themselves into the pickles my Legorns have. I truly believe they are one of the dumbest breeds of chicken available.

Another point against them is they have almost no meat on their bones and do not gain no matter how much they are fed. They are also have a tendency to be aggressive against my Cornish X.

We have 4 leg horns and they just don't fit us. They are a few months old and lay well but as far as being able to be social with them... Out of the question. They are nervous birds who don't like human contact. If we go to pet them they squawk and run. We paid $8 a bird and they were not laying when we got them that's how young they were. They are still small and seem to be slow growing. Once they get large enough they will be at our table. If you are looking for a large egg layer who is friendly theses are NOT the bird for you.

My Leghorn "Betty" is the sweetest chicken! She coo's when she hears me coming. She comes running into my tack room with the dogs to get treats. She is a real joy !! The best out of all my chickens.

I have some rose comb brown lehorns and they are great. I am actually going to get more this fall. Mine are extremly human friendly. My one I care around with me all the time. She just falls asleep when hold or carry her. She is very calm too. My other is a little more skitish but isnt bad. Mine are actually towards the bottom of the pecking order, but they couldnt care less. They talk my ear off! As soon as they see me coming they all just start chattering away. They talk to me the whole time i'm around. Mine actually dont lay that goodd, but I dont really care, because I dont eat eggs anyways. Overall they are great. I wouldnt part with them especially my one girl, she is my buddy!

Most of mine are not even laying yet - 14 weeks old. But I have been in love with my Brown Leghorns since they were sold to me as Ameraucana They greet me at the coop door and jump on my shoulders, head and arms demanding to be pet. The whites are as flighty as I'd heard but are extremely soft to the touch.

A friend gave me two leghorn babies this year that were originally purchased from TSC. The birds are about six months now. One has started to lay a week ago, still waiting for the other one to lstart. I am getting an egg a day. I was very excited to finally get white eggs after having only brown and blue for the past few years. There doesn't seem to be any quarrels between them and the other birds. They tend to stick to themselves. My birds are free ranging in a city lot with a 4ft fence. They leghorns are the only ones in the group that tend to hop the fence. Luckily they only go to the one side and that neighbor doesn't care but still would prefer they didn't leave my yard. They are really skiddish, flighty birds that won't let me near them and even if I am 10 ft away, start freaking out and running across the yard. I can use this to my advantage to get them back on into my yard, as that all I have to do is chase them towards the fence and they fly back over. I took care of them daily when they were small and in a cage but as soon as they got free range of the yard, they won't let me near them. Luckily they are getting along with the rest of the flock and I can deal with them not wanting to be my pets.