What to order?

[NikSmith]

Hey all,
I'll be ordering some little chicks here within a few weeks-month. (Weeks/days if I have any say!)
I'm just curious as to what you suggest to order. I live in SE Montana so we get hot summers, but the winters can get quite cold.
I don't want the boring brown chickens. We want the unique, funny looking weird ones! Yet ones that are best suited for hot summers, cold winters. I also want the colour variety of the eggs. I'm definitely going to get some Ameracaunas, just for the egg colour, but what do you suggest for other chickens?
Thanks!!

 

[Wyandottes7]

Ameraucanas are a good choice. I would also recommend Wyandottes-- they come in many colors, and are quite winter hardy. They have an interesting, inquisitive personality, in my experience and are humorous to watch. For different colored eggs, you could look into Marans. They lay dark brown eggs, and as long as you don't get rooster (which have large single combs), they should be winter hardy. If you got Ameraucanas, Wyandottes, and Marans, you'd have a nice varied egg basket with green/blue eggs, light brown eggs, and chocolate colored eggs.

 

[lazy gardener]

There's also a brown leghorn with rose comb that would give you a nice white egg.

 

[Coralietg]

I have an order coming in March with mainly meat chicks, but I ordered some Light Brahmas and Cuckoo Marans to add to my layers. I have one Cuckoo Marans and she lays a beautiful darker speckled egg. I've had two attempts to raise a Light Brahma, first ended in a dog wipe-out, second little bugger went into the road. They are lovely looking chickens with feathered legs.

 

[Anna-MN]

I live in MN and we get extremely cold winters and very hot summers. My birds that do the best HANDS DOWN are Speckled Sussex. They lay a nice brown egg and have gorgeous feathers. I would suggest birds that do not get very large combs because of frost bite in the winter. My Orpingtons and Blue Andalusians seem to always get a little bit of frost bite no matter how much I try to prevent it.