When does the peeping stop and the clucking begin? My girls are almost 7 weeks old, and fully feathered. The look like chickens, but they sure don't sound like them. When will they get their big girl voices?
My little sisters (Rhode Island reds) are still in between the cluck and a bit of a peep. and they are almost 4 months old. Depending on the breed, they will cluck when they are ready. the Golden comets I got a couple of years ago have a growling cluck...
I have 3 sets of chicks, about 2, 3, and 4 months old. The oldest ones (several different breeds) stopped chirping and started trying to cluck at about 3 months old. The second group (Dominiques) are now 3 months old. They don't chirp anymore, but they don't cluck either. They are just quiet! The 2 month old chicks (Dominiques) still chirp like crazy.
My first one began to cluck at about 6 weeks, she alternated peeping and clucking. The rest followed suit and all were clucking by around, um 10 weeks or so. They are now almost 20 weeks and wow can they be loud when they all get going in the morning. Each one has their own voice, though. We love it.
Thanks for mentioning Golden Comets and that weird growling sound they make, I thought mine were deranged. It's not like they're aggressive or angry, they growl when something interests them or something happens. Weird deranged chickens.
I love the peeps. They grow up so fast already. mine are almost 11 weeks old and peeping all the time.
Mine don't exactly peep any more but then again they don't always cluck it is more like a bawkkkk bawk bawk at times.
My five week old Jersey Giants have a happy warble and occasionally cheep. I think the clucking is linked to a hormonal thing and will occur a few weeks prior to egg production. Normal hens start laying around 25 weeks and Comets start laying much earlier. (16 weeks?) I did have a Bantam Barred Rock start a humorous type of crowing at 5 weeks of age.