Icelandic Chickens

[Jake Levi]

Happy reading Ace ! Lots of good stuff all of the way through !

Nickeyo any more pics of your bantam Phoenix?

All free range turkeys fly, if they want to but the best I know of are the Wishard strain of Bronze. Powerful flyers but great homestead turkeys. They will range for easily half of their feed, or more and the hens raise good broods on their own. Sadly there are very few of them left.

 

[RedIII]

Jake, I don't know if my turkey hen is a Wishard. I've been told that she is some kind of standard bronze. She is an incredible flyer and was an excellent mother last year when raising a brood - better than my best chicken. It seems like turkeys are very good mothers, or at least the bronzes are, from what I've seen. If Wishards are good flyers, I'd hate to see how much further they can fly!

And, I had a surprise this morning.

 

[Nickeyo]

cute chicks

here is another pic of my phoenix bantams, I also hope one day that i can get icelandics

 

[Jake Levi]

Thats another precocious Icelandic ! Which mine all tend to be ! The 22-23 day incubators are the exception in my flock. I really think that it is another Icelandic survival trait, get hatched and get it done, times awasting !

What is your turkey being bred to? Another bronze? I really like the Wishard, they are super mothers and the most trouble free turkey that I have ever had. Right now I have two Black Spanish, one Jake that is going in the freezer and a hen I will probably breed to a Bourbon Red. Or not. If I can find some Wishard I will add them.

Nikeyo I do like your phoenix, those tails sure dont seem to hurt their flying ! Probably act as good stabilizers. Their color is much like an Icelandics.

 

[drumstick diva]

Nikeyo what beautiful, fascinating birds you have. I bet they are first to fly out of the brooder. Keep the pictures coming.

 

[Nickeyo]

is there much of a difference between an Icelandic and a Sweedish flower chicken

 

[Nickeyo]

and thanks for your kind words, my friesians are a lot like Icelandics in ways and can fly a bit, but they don't like the phoenix so the phoenix fly into the trees to escape them. Its quite fun to watch them flap about, the friesians never catch them and end up standing at a tree trunk looking up at the phoenixs perched looking down

 

[Jake Levi]

There are differences, mostly in colors and patterns, the Icelandic is much more varied in coloration.

To find out would take keeping both for a period of time to compare traits. But to find true differences needs DNA testing which to the best of my knowledge hasnt happened. I would really like to see it happen, I am pretty sure that the Icelandics DNA is quite difference from most modern breeds and is most likely to be in the running for the purest breed in the world from its long isolation from other stock.

 

[acemario]

Hey all! So i started reading from the beginning of the thread! What a crazy adventure! Since Mary's stories three years ago, how much has the breed expanded?

 

[RedIII]

Aww, poor Phoenix's. They do look very lovely, though. I love that the one let you take a picture with the Santa hat on him

The SFH's are also larger than the Icelandics, from what I understood. Icelandics tend to be smaller for LF, kind of like Polish. All three of my girls are dainty little things, and my one, Flekka, is just tiny. She's the smallest hen I have out there.

Ace, from what I've read and all, there are now more people on the East coast that have Icelandics, mostly from Behl's line. It sounds like there are at least several flocks that we know about in the Midwest, as well, and a few in Texas. I don't know how many have them on the West coast - I can't remember. There's a flock that used to belong to Mahonri down in Arizona. Shawn has his flock/two flocks up in Idaho, and I have mine here. There are at least one or two other people in Utah who now have them that I don't actually know. And now you, yay!

Also, the other egg that developed under my broody is hatching. So two babies for meeeeee.