Chicken Rookies!

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arent87

arent87

Chirping
Jun 8, 2015
31
7
64
Culpeper, VA
Hello Everyone!

I'm retired from the US Air Force, living in Virginia. My wife and I just bought our first chickens ever in early May.

We know NOTHING about raising chickens, other than what we've heard (a little bit of work, fun, easy, fun, rewarding, more fun)

So we bought 6 baby chicks from Tractor Supply out of two separate, unlabeled bins (minimum purchase was 6 chickens). So we picked four from one bin which the worker assured us were all female (two dark and two light) - the two dark appear to be Barred Plymouth Rock/Plymouth Rock and the two lighter ones are now much more red with some lighter feathers around the face with a few light feathers here and there - possibly New Hampshire or Rhode Island Red?

From the other the other bin, we were somewhat assured were females ("These are all females too?" "Yep those are straight runs") - so we got home and looked up straight runs...
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Anyhoo... We picked one light and one dark one from that bin. The light one is obviously a female, and growing VERY quickly, like half again the size of all the other chickens, and VERY sweet and friendly. It's looking like she might be a Buff Orpington (I'm learning chicken breeds by pouring through pictures trying to identify what ours might be). We named her Sophia LaHen (the first four don't really have names yet - but one has more white on her face so my wife has been starting to call her Mrs White (like from the game 'Clue').

The DARK one from that bin is another story - not friendly, has never liked to be touched, has always freaked out even as a tiny chick whenever we picked her up to move her so we named her 'Henny Penny' because she acted like the sky was falling every time we touched her... She is very black with no light feathers at all, a comb that is very spiky, developing very quickly and is already red... We're thinking that Henny Penny is not a Henny after all, but probably a Chanticleer... Her (his) black feathers have begun taking on a deep greenish hue when the light hits them just right (Black Orpington Rooster?) She/He gets along very well with the other chickens and is startlingly strong, compared to all the others, but i guess if it is a rooster, he's not at the age of feeling compelled to protect his flock because he's still very timid and stays well away from us, but sloooowly getting more brave.

Last weekend we received our coop, which we bought from Urban Coops. I built it, we moved the chickens in, and I put chicken wire around the ground along the outside of the coop, tucked it under the legs and buried it - and it already stopped something from digging in and getting to our chickens thank goodness!!

Anyway, this site has already been a huge help to us and we look forward to MANY discussions in the future, as I'm sure we'll be needing a lot of mentoring!

Thanks!
 
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Glad you could join us!!

Sounds like you have a lovely little flock...i hope they grow up well! This is a great forum, and everyone is so helpful. Feel free to ask any questions.

How old are your chicks? I can't really tell without pics of course, but most likely Henny Penny is a Black Australorp or a Black sex link...Black orpingtons are not a common breed, so it is doubtful a feed store would have them :)
 
Green sheen in the black feathers, makes me think Black Australorp (comes down from Orpingtons) If she already has a red spiked comb, I would think Cockerel.
 
Ah, interesting. Thanks cityfarmer! I think you're right, he/she/it just might be the black sex link - the pics of chicks looks closest to what he looked like when we bought him. I'll have to take a picture of him after work today and post it on here.

We bought the chicks May 2nd - so as of this Saturday (June 13) we will have had them for 6 weeks. They were tiny and fuzzy - no age was given. The two out of the 'straight run' bin were a little bit bigger than the other four, so we're guessing they are all between 6 and 7 weeks old.

We raised them in the garage until we got the coop delivered and built, then moved them out. We have a heck of a time getting them into the roost at night so we can close them in. We're out in the country on 5 acres with LOTS of foxes, raccoons, possum, skunks, hawks, owls... so we're the overly cautious new parents. We also have black bear that roam through the yard once in a while but have never heard of bears having any interest in chickens, and even if they did, not much I could do about it. They usually tear up the bird feeders and other people's bee hives....

Anyway, we don't let them free range because locals tell horror stories of having to replace 3-4 chickens per year due to predation, so the coop has a 5' x 10' run, which we already want to add to for them... and we are trying to get them in the habit of coming inside to roost at night but they ignore us for the most part, so I have to catch a couple and put them in, then the others eventually go in to find out why the first ones are peeping and bitter about being locked in. Takes about a half hour or so to get them locked down for the night.
 
Thanks Drumstick - Now I'll definitely have to take a picture and post it here. He's very pretty - like I said, he gets along well with the other chickens, but gets pretty bossy once in a while... just not old enough to start being territorial just yet, but I've been reading up on how to keep myself from letting him beat me up when he gets older! And also reading up on building a coop of his very own :)
 
Here is "Henny Penny"... but we think it's a "Chanticleer" (from the cartoon our kids loved, 'Rock-a-Doodle') instead... Boy or girl?

 
Two of the unnamed four... two of the reds (Rhode Island or New Hampshire?) and two of the black & white (Plymouth Rock?). All obvious females...

 
arent87 said:
Here is "Henny Penny"... but we think it's a "Chanticleer" (from the cartoon our kids loved, 'Rock-a-Doodle') instead... Boy or girl?

Click to expand...
this looks like a black australorp cockerel. A Black sex link boy would be barred, lik a poorly bred barred rock, not black :)

arent87 said:
Sophia LaHen = obviously female... Buff Orpington?

Click to expand...
hard to tell for the pic, one without the wire in better lighting would help, but she actually looks like a red sex link to me...maybe its just the lighting though.

arent87 said:
Two of the unnamed four... two of the reds (Rhode Island or New Hampshire?) and two of the black & white (Plymouth Rock?). All obvious females...

Click to expand...
the red ones do look like new Hampshire reds, or maybe production reds. I can't tell from the pic if the specked one is a barred rock or a Dominique (or something different).
 

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