Breed discussion

[SusanMc]

Hi y’all
I was hoping we all can talk about raising different breeds/ cross breeds of chickens ?

Currently I have Barred Plymouth Rocks, Americanas( recent Ameraucana cross) , an Easter egger and a Silverudd blue

And overall I find the Barred rocks to be very docile and curious. The americanas are docile as well but a bit less reluctant to be lap birds and fight the most amongst each other. The Easter egger is bossy to the other birds, but will allow herself to be petted. The Silverudd blue is quiet, less active and docile as well, she can be bit standoffish to the other birds. I don’t have any silver dud blue. My Ameraucauna chicks are 10 weeks, my Plymouth rocks are 2 years.


Nice

I agree with the Plymouth Rocks, one of mine is very much a lap chicken, and my flock of Ameraucauna chicks, do fight a lot amongst themselves, little squabbles and pecks, I found out that the breeder I got them from doesn’t breed colour to colour which is why mine look different.

 

[Lauravonsmurf]

I’ve kept the EE type Ameraucauna and enjoyed them every time. The girls in the photo I had for 5 years till taken. So generally a healthy breed, but definitely not lap birds.

We had a RIR that thought she was a dog... even slept with the dogs in the dog house. She was a lap chicken. She was my daughters 4 H show bird... everyone else’s kids had bantams for the whole this is a chicken here are it parts of competition... not my little kid, she had this huge bird... the leader of the project thought there was no way she could do well with a bird that was almost half the size of my kid and a standard breed, as know one dies that (we only had 1 chicken at the time) but unlike the bantams that pecked everyone, Henny Penny just wanted to be held, and petted and show off. She knew she was getting attention, so she loved it... lol. All the kids used chopsticks to encourage their chickens to walk... my daughter figured out that would never work with a big chicken so she voice command trained the chicken with treats she would say “Walkies” and that bird would jump up and walk in straight line. That bird also learned via the dogs to come to a whistle tune we used... anyway my daughter won lots of shows with the hatchery not fancy production RIR... anyway every bird my little girl showed was huge... she won big with her geese too... so funny this kid with birds as big as her.

I was going to put my niece and nephew in 4H but COVID hit... I will contact them again soon.