I don’t generally do more that lurk here, but I had to chime in to this discussion. By FAR, Speckled Sussex chickens are our favorite chickens of all time closely followed by Light Sussex. We have had a variety of show quality and hatchery quality chickens for over 20 years now and that is the conclusion my husband and I have both come to. They are friendly, sweet natured, inquisitive, smart (for a chicken) and great foragers.
We thought very seriously about becoming breeders of Speckled Sussex a couple years ago but decided against it as we didn’t want to exhibit or have too too many chickens. We felt a decision like that shouldn’t be taken lightly especially in light of the fact there are few breeders of great quality ones as it is. We would have hated to become one more farm that had good intentions but fell flat.
On our perfect farm I believe we would have stricktly Sussex of all varieties in the best quality of the breed. We are down to three, two of which are ten years old. Chickens generally die of old age on our farm. Sussex are a great breed of chicken.
