Hah! It's true! A few of the cockerels are so striking that you can spot them out of the crowd across the yard. The oldest pullets are as large as the boys already. My husband keeps looking at them filling up on groceries and asks me when I will cull. I told him not this summer and not over the winter. I want them to all reach a year old before then. That's one of the reasons we are eating the Production birds as they get meat on them. My property is a scant 1/2 acre. It's divided into barn yard, runs, foraging areas, lawn, orchard, and fenced vegetable plot. If I'm keeping twenty two reds for a year and a dozen Silkie brooders and breeders, there is little room for anything else.
@Fogelly: I will get all the females together and all the boys together and try and get good pictures of the group. They are only a couple months old so it's a joy watching them grow. And growing they certainly are.
About the comment on my nine week old chicks looking lethargic and anemic. That comment actually made me laugh! Content, full crop chicks chilling in the sun late afternoon certainly do look lethargic but you should see that whole flock run full speed across the lawn when they see me with the feed bucket! They are a picture of health and vitality!
