Is my she a he???

[hharris49]

Hi there, I know how you feel with so many unanswered questions. My husband and I moved to Tennessee last year and we purchased 6 Buff Orpington pullets from our local Mennonite farmers. They told us they were approx. 4-5 months old at that time (Nov 30th 2013). Well this spring one of our hens (Pinhead) went broody and no matter what we tried we couldn't break her of it. So after almost 3 months she was wasting away because she wouldn't leave the coop to free-range, so we got 5 fertilized eggs from our daughter's landlord to let her hatch them, anything, something!! She successfully hatched 3 babies of mixed breed. Two are an Aracauna (momma) and RIR (daddy) mix. We think they may be 2 roosters because they face off, puff up and go at each other. I have been trying to find out more information online myself and it led me to your post. I DO know that fertilized eggs do not taste any different than unfertilized eggs. They will not stay fresh as long though. I love my Buff's the best. We have since purchased approx. 2 week old Barred Plymouth Rocks from the Mennonites in May, so they are about 4 months old now. So we have 5 Buff's (we recently lost our first hen), 6 Barred Rocks, and 3 mix breed babies that are about 6 weeks old. There is a group on Facebook called Purely Positive Chickens that you could join. Everyone on there is very helpful when you have questions.

 

[Michael OShay]

Or you could look for some Red or Black Sexlink pullets. Sexlinks are sexed by color, so you can tell the males and females apart at hatch.

X2 on getting sex link pullets. They are excellent choices as they are easy to sex by color and are egg laying machines, consistently churning out over 300 eggs per hen per year. I've raised both the Black and Red Sex Links for years (still have the Blacks) and they are wonderful birds. I especially like the Black Sex Links as mine have been friendlier than my Red Sex Links and my Blacks have laid slightly better than my Reds in really cold, winter weather.

 

[mamahenAtlanta]

I'm new to chickens too -- ordered 6 (various breeds) chicks, sexed pullets. My only Buff orpington turned out to be a roo (it was very noticeable at 4-5 weeks--looked exactly like yours). I have to re-home him but I do love him so much..... I also have a red sexlink and she is wonderful! She is quite bossy and very spoiled. When I feed them treats, they all gather at my feet (except for Lucy the sex link) and she insists that she must be fed in my lap or on my shoulder! When I first got them all, I knew I had at least one pullet. I would go with that if you want to add some hens. And I think you definitely need three hens for a 'flock' so that Kitty won't be lonely. I've found a good home for Mr. Omelet (the roo) from a BYC member here, but I'm stalling on delivery because I will miss him so much. He's so handsome! And luckily, all the others are pullets so I'm thrilled. And mine are only 10 weeks so no crowing yet.

 

[ArmourFarmers]

Thank you for all the helpful advice. We ended up getting four more Buff Orpington pullets and we're too attached to our possible rooster to not at least try our hand at having him in the flock. We'll just do our research and hope for the best. I'll definitely keep you posted, but so far he looks the same and acts the same

Chickolette

Kitty