Yesterday we went shopping for some chickens for that empty, adorable little chicken coop! It is getting easier and easier to find little chickens year round! It used to be kind of a springtime thing...now, there seems to be much more demand. I personally think this is GREAT.
I still have to learn a lot about chickens, but, one thing I've learned is that you hope they are all hens and sometimes they aren't :(
The store we visited was a farm type store. They had a surprising selection of little chicks. They had Barred Rock (sometimes called Plymouth Rock), Rhode Island Red, Golden Sex Link, Banty hens, and Cornish. I wasn't familiar with the Cornish so I quickly researched it on trusty Goggle! It seems that Cornish are good mothers and can get broody. 3 years ago I had no clue what that meant. Now I know and I know I don't want broody hens! If you want to "breed" chickens and keep roosters then you would probably like the Cornish variety.
Our favorite breed so far has been the New Hampshire Red. They are big and mellow and hearty and they lay lots of eggs. They are not broody! We have one chicken of undetermined heritage that occasionally gets broody. It's not pleasant. A broody hen will lay an egg and not move. They will continue this pattern until they are sitting on several eggs! They won't let the other hens into the egg box to lay their eggs. They hiss and squawk if you get close to them or try and collect an egg. They can actually do this for days and it's possible that they can starve or dehydrate themselves for their unwillingness to leave those darn eggs! Now, you could see this as a good thing if you actually want to get baby chickens. At the time our chicken went into her broody phase we were not in possession of a rooster. So, she could sit on those eggs until the cows came home and there will never be any baby chicks for all her commitment!
From my understanding, the only guarantee you will not end up with a rooster is if you get a Sex Link. There are black or golden Sex Links. I guess all Sex Link chickens that are black or gold are female. So far it has proven true with our experience. That is the extent of my knowledge on the biology of the Sex Links.
This Sprout is getting the new chickens today. For some reason she was much more enamored with the baby ducks. I totally get it...baby ducks really are adorable!
This is what was finally decided on for the Sprout and her parents. Two Golden Sex Links and two Barred Rock. At least we know the Sex Links are female!
I LOVE the way the Barred Rock look. Much to my sadness, we have not been successful at keeping a Barred Rock in our flock. Yet!
Okay, check out this gorgeous Barred Rock we had for a bit. They are all checkerboardy and amazing looking. You know why this Barred Rock was especially lovely? Yep, that's right! It turned out to be a rooster! We ended up naming him "Transformer". We tried to keep Transformer for awhile and give it a shot at having a rooster. Nope...not cool. Those 2, 3 and 4 a.m. wake-up calls make the neighbors really unsupportive of your chicken rearing! Don't worry...Transformer found a good home on a farm in the country...! (really!)
We had another hen that turned out to be a rooster as well. Oh my...what we thought was a hen just kept getting bigger and more beautiful daily. Lovely blue/black feathery plumes flowing from the tail section. Hello...can you say rooster? We were bummed. We also tried to make it work with handsome "Crowbar"...but to no avail. His crowing and <ahem> aggressiveness with the girls was just too much for us urban farmers...Crowbar also found a good home in the country.
The newbies made it home to their new abode all safe and sound. I hear the Sprout sat out by the coop and chatted with them for about an hour. Sitting in her car seat she reassured them on the drive home and keep telling them "it's okay"!
And, so it begins...another little urban farm and another little sprout that knows where her eggs come from!
No...this isn't my license plate. Some other lucky person got it first!!!
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