Which of these chickens should i get?

Jemma Rider

Songster
Nov 25, 2017
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488
141
Maryland
Hi, so i am extremely indecisive about the chickens i want this year. I want so many breeds but i can't have all of them. I'm more into the appearance of chickens then the egg laying, though i would like to have fairly friendly chickens. I have 90 square feet of run space and 30 square feet of coop. I know i should only have about one chicken per three foot of coop space but i don't know about the run. I have five chickens right now, two Amerucanas and two Easter Eggers and one mixed breed rooster. And i defiantly want to get a black Sumatra and two Silkies, so that gives me eight. So i guess what I'm asking is which of these breeds would be best. I need breeds that tolerate confinement well until i get around to expanding (probably around late summer), i need friendly birds (because they are pets not livestock), and visually stunning birds. I have a little feud with a friend of mine around our chicken breeds. I try to let my chickens free range once a day for an hour or two but i can't let them out while I'm not out there because i have a few hawks stalking them. So here is the list. It's very long and i am just so indecisive. I only want one of each as well (unless that could cause problems but i haven't read anything against only having one of each breed).
Buff crested polish
Black cooper marans
Buff Orpington bantam
Barred rock bantam
Speckled sussex
Snowy easter egger
Mille Fleur d’Uccle bantam
Buff Brahma bantam
(Sorry if i misspelled a few it's eleven at night)
I will be expanding my run mid to end summer, and i won't be getting my chicks until early July so they might not be outside until after i expand everything.
Thanks to all who provide help, i know my list is quite demanding :barnie
 
I'd get rid of the Polish. They're flighty and they don't get along well with other birds, partially because of their obscured vision. Since you want them to be 'stunning,' I doubt you'll really want to trim their crests, and even if you did, that still won't solve the flightiness problem.

No opinion whatsoever on the rest. I only have Polish, Cochin, and OEG bantams (and the Polish are crosses and still the least friendly birds I've ever owned.)
 
Buff crested polish
No experience

Black cooper marans
Friendly, good egg layers. If you want dark eggs, get them from a breeder, not a hatchery or a feed store.

Buff Orpington bantam
I have had a few of these. .. of course the breeder sexed tgem wrong and only one turned out to be a hen, but still friendly from what I've read. I say 'from what I've read' because my BO (they were standard.. not bantam) were a little on the roudy side since they were all roos

Barred rock bantam
I had two standard barred rocks, one roo... one hen. Both sweet abd gentle, a littke on the timid side though.

Speckled sussex
No experience

Snowy easter egger
'Snowy' easter egger? Like, a white EE? I had three easter eggers recently. They were clingy, very friendly and would hop up on your shoulder. The downside is that that lay snall eggs and mine laid white. :(
Mille Fleur d’Uccle bantam
No experience

Buff Brahma bantam
I recently had a standard Light Brahma. Sge was sweet and ever so gentle. She was a little sassy on the roost though. She wasn't mean just noisy and yellin' at everyone. :)
She laud large pink/briwn eggs.
 
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Barred Rock Bantam all the way! One of the better egg layers of the bantams, very hardy in heat and cold and pretty to look at. A little on the standoffish side though. She did have a prolapse this past year but she came out of that nicely. Here is Cookie:
IMG_9368.JPG
I have more pictures somewhere. ;)
 
I can also put in a good word for Mille Fleur d'Uccles. Muffin is very cute, sweet, comical and best friends with Cookie. Since she is so small she doesn't handle the cold as well as Cookie and she gets overheated more quickly than the others. She often tries to go broody and I'm sure she would make a good mother. She lays more eggs than your average d'Uccle. Again I have more pictures somewhere...
IMG_6205.JPG
 
Ok, it's 4sq ft per chicken in the coop & 10q ft per chicken in the run AND we all know more space the better for flock harmony. You've got 5 now, wanting to add your 3 choices, that's 8 and you're caught up in Chicken Math :oops:

I'm not sure the same space rules apply for bantams. According to Chickens for dummies, bantams only need a minimum of one square foot of space in the coop and four in the run. (This is why TSC is able to get away with selling those "16 chicken coops." that are so often inhabited by poor, crushed, standard-sized chickens.)
 
Buff crested polish
Only raised one for a few months, kind of skittish and very flighty

Black cooper marans
No personal experience

Buff Orpington bantam
Never even heard of these guys!

Barred rock bantam
Not specifically barred but we had a silver penciled plymouth rock bantam and she was a lovely little hen <3

Speckled sussex
I've met a few lovely ladies but never owned any myself.

Snowy easter egger
I'm not sure what a 'snowy easter egger' is but I do know that easter eggers are lovely little ladies, thought a bit noisy at times ^^

Mille Fleur d’Uccle bantam

Lovely birds! We had the absolute sweetest rooster and the most amazing hen for so long!

Buff Brahma bantam

I've only seen these guys at my 4H shows, never met anyone who owns them though ^^
 
I had hatchery Easter Eggers and Speckled Sussex and loved them! They were from Murray McMurray Hatchery. If I had the space I’d order more Speckled Sussex from them just for the eye candy and friendliness. They were so fun to have around! The EEs were good too and laid blue eggs. Unfortunately a Bobcat wiped out most of my flock a couple years ago so I don’t have them anymore.

Edited to add: I didn’t read that you already had EEs and I too don’t know what a “Snowy EE” is...
One concern I have with your list is mixing Bantams and LF. I was also told that Silkies can get picked on by other birds due to them being quite different than your average chicken. I have no experience with mixing Bantams and LF so maybe someone else can comment on that? I have only ever had LF.
 
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