Our birds, all of them top, standard bred, excellent exhibition examples of their breeds, Rocks and Reds, are all FARM BIRDS. Every last one of them.
Please make no mistake. Yes, once or twice a year, they're dipped and dried, put up in a conditioning pen and taken to a show, well, a few of them anyhow, as I am not gonna wash 3 dozen birds, LOL. They get judged and exhibited openly against the finest birds and toughest competition around. I do not wish to be just some imagined, internet virtual breeder, but a real breeder without "barn blindness". i want the birds judged for how well they meet the Standard. It is encouraging to spend time with good poultry folks and judges, some of the best folks you'll ever meet.
Then, those birds get taken home and they go right back to work. They roll in the dirt and scratch and forage and within an hour or two one would ask, "What show birds?". I don't really keep or breed "show birds". I breed birds to the Standard and take them to a show or two, but they are unequivocally just farm birds.
And when folks come by our place to maybe purchase some produce from our farm, they may know nothing about poultry, but these birds often stop them dead in their tracks. They turn and stare, and finally say, "I know nothing about chickens but those are most gorgeous birds I've ever seen".
That.
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