Official Poll: How old is / was your oldest chicken?

[Momturtle]

My oldest was a 23 year old sebright hen. Still incubated a nest of eggs every year but they just weren't hers. She only laid about one a month. She would find a nest though and hatch out the eggs in that, even a nest of guinea fowl one year. Finanally died defending her last brood from a fox. Great old hen and I still love Sebrights.

 

[Jajika]

In my unofficial and unprofessional opinion, it appears to me that "mutts" do live longer. Maybe it is the mixing of the DNA?

 

[ChicwannaB]

Quote:
awwwww...what a valiant mother.

 

[sianara]

My oldest is a hen Serena who turned 9 years old. She was hatched May 2002 and she's the only remaining chicken from my first flock. She's a rosecomb brown leghorn who still lays 1-2 eggs a week

 

[humbird46]

hello,
Ihave a white banty that i adopted from my neighbor. owner told me she was 10 years old when she gave her to me and i have had her for 2 yrs. All my other chickens are twice her size but it doesnt matter she runs the whole place and lays an egg a day small but mmmmmmm so good.

 

[JustJane]

My oldest was Minerva, a RIR. She was one of my first flock. I got them from McMurray in the mid 1970's. I usually left the back door open for fresh air. She found the door and saw, just inside the door, the bowl of cat food, well... Her beak was tweeked upwards on one side :/and she would cock her head sideways and look up at me, then she would say a soft "cawk?" as tho to ask permission to eat a little cat food. She was at least 7 when I went out to feed one morning and found her dead.

Jane

 

[Celtic Chick]

I have a hen & rooster partridge bantam pair that turned 9 in March. My sis has a few 9 year olds, too.

 

[Barrdwing]

When I was a kid, our very first flock of hens included a funny-looking little EE mix that was my sister's favorite. She was white with a brown chest, green shanks, muffs and beard, a prodigious fan tail, and a single comb that bent sharply right, then folded over to the left and lay on top of her head like a tricorn hat. Her name was Chicken Little, and she was the top hen in the flock. She developed an internally ruptured crop at three years old that didn't even slow her down; she bustled around the coop and yard with her bulging front giving her quite the matronly figure, putting the smackdown on much larger hens. She outlived all of her agemates and a large number of younger birds, and was thirteen years old when she passed away.

After Chicken Little, I get pretty upset to lose a hen at four years old because of stuff like egg yolk peritonitis. I think it's time to select some birds for longevity and health! Chicken Little was one heck of a mutt, and I'm sure that contributed tremendously to her toughness.

 

[dalalune]

Right now I have 3 "old" chickens, all Dominiques. I have a 6 yr. old hen that is still laying, an 8yr. old hen that only lays once in a blue moon and the grand daddy of them all is BUD, my 12 yr old Dominique rooster. He is such a neat old man but I can tell he is starting to slow down a bit. He is the oldest animal of any kind on our farm since the passing of our 15 yr. old Border Collie, 2 yrs ago. We just want to keep our animals as long as possible. (I would post a pic but I cannot figure out how...)

 

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I have a leghorn named Jeffrey who is 12 years old.