drstratton
Enabler
Thank you for all the information...she really is a lovely lady!CHOOK of the WEEK.View attachment 2780114
Soda.
Soda is a Barred Rock, one of 2. She & her sister Hepzibah, are part of the 5 original hens I purchased when I returned to chicken keeping after a prolonged absence & is now my lead hen. This is somewhat surprising as she was the youngest of the 3 BRs I got, the last to lay, lowest in the pecking order & seemed to be always playing catch~ups to impress the bigger girls. With the loss of my Australorps she rose to prominence as her sister wasn't interested in being the lead hen. She is a big, calm steady hen with a preponderance of the meat genes for a dual purpose bird. She's one very big lady. Hepzibah is less than 1/2 her size.
This is an American breed & has always been very popular since they were developed in the latter half of the 19th centaury as the hens are good steady layers of fairly large brown eggs. My girls have always laid more buff coloured ones & as they age the eggs are getting much lighter coloured & are now barely coloured @ all.
Dominiques, Cochins, Black Javas & Brahamas probably went into the mix that created these birds ~ but as is usually the case, no~one really knows 100% for sure. They are however a sex~linked bird so you can tell the males from the females right from the get go ~ which is not good news for the young cockerels but helpful for those of us who are not allowed roosters.
I chose BRs for my 1st hens as they have a reputation for being calm, friendly, non aggressive birds ~ & it's true they were nowhere near as dominant as my Australorps, who could be downright mean, but they are certainly the most dominant of the breeds I now own ~ though Portia & Shuri, being Wyandottes, may give them a run for their money as they mature. Certainly Portia can compete for sheer size!
To a large extent how one views any particular breed is in part determined by what other breeds are in the tribes, how they compare & interact & the role they assume. Many of my breeds are smart & flighty. This isn't to say that BRs are dumb & without character but they are much steadier than my Campines & their sheer weight means they are not fliers! It does mean I have to keep an eye on them during their moult as managing the higher roosts they like becomes quite difficult.
For me these girls are a *bread & butter* hen: plain, no~nonsence, sensible, smart & good leaders. They add a very necessary balance to the mad hatters of the company & much as I love the mad hatters they would be in a lot of trouble without Soda @ the helm supplying that steadying influence.
...this is now my chair! 
