Heritage Chicken Breeds

Welcome to the Skeffling Chicken Article Summary

This is a charity article and is intended to make it easier to find our other chicken articles on Infobarrel.  My apologies for all the links, but I hope it makes these easier to find.  I will be adding more articles as I write them so this article keeps growing!

If you have any suggestions for articles, chicken questions you would like answered or need chicken help, feel free to comment below.  I would love to help you.

Articles on Heritage Chicken Breeds

We have had  a number of rare heritage chicken breeds in the 4 years we've had our own chicken flock.  It is so neat to compare the different breeds, side by side.  We have our favourites, and I have written extensively on the internet about them. 

One of our favourite pet breeds and that lay well for their size are the Belgian D'Uccle bantam chickens.  These sweet talkative tiny chickens are endearing and make delightful pets.  They sometimes lay their eggs in secret locations, but they certainly lay lots of eggs.  It seems,  the smarter the chickens, the more likely they lay their eggs somewhere secret!

The Partridge Chantecler is a rare Canadian heritage chicken breed and are great productive egg layers that do well in icy cold climates with shorter day length.  Chanteclers make wonderful broody hens and will raise any chicks you let them hatch.

Partridge Chantecler Heritage Chicken Breed

The Black Sumatras are an extremely rare and underestimated rare chicken breed for most people.  They are an intelligent, stubborn and confident chicken breed and well worth considering one or two in your back yard chicken flock.  Black Sumatra chickens are considered undomesticated and that can put people off, but Sumatras are not aggressive and can be both affectionate and entertaining.

The rare and newly imported Euskal Oiloas Basque chickens are another wonderful intelligent backyard chicken.  They are friendly, productive and vigorous and recommended if you want an all-round excellent dual purpose chicken for eggs and meat.

Those who want blue eggs may want to have the sweet docile Wheaten Ameraucanas Chickens.  Even if they didn't lay lovely blue eggs, these beautiful calm chickens would be welcome in the coop. 

Articles on Keeping chickens

Keeping chickens is a wonderful past time with the bonus of fresh eggs and enjoyable pets.  Think of it as  responsibility like a dog or cat.  The better the chickens' housing and care, the more productive and enjoyable your birds will be.

There are some surprising things we have learned and noticed from having rare breed chickens and are great to learn about before you get them, so you are not disappointed and can be properly prepared to get the best experience.

Also reading about how chicken make the best pets and which heritage chicken breeds are better than others is a great way to get started chicken keeping, especially if you have kids that will want to handle the birds and collect eggs.

Blue Silky Chicken - make lovely pet chickens

Tips on Handling, Hatching, and Incubating Fertilised Chicken Eggs

Hatching is such a fun wonderful experience when done well.  It can be a very disappointing if not done well.  By reading about choosing easy to use egg incubators that will do a great job for you, you will increase your chances of success and enjoymnet of the whole magical process. 

An accurate thermometer is just as important and we talk about the Brinsea Spot Check the best thermometer you can buy to use with an incubator.  It will make you more sure of your temperatures and the more steady that temperature and humidity in the incubator, the stronger the chicks will be when hatched.

Hatching eggs need to be handled and stored a certain way to ensure they have the best chance of developing into chicks that are able to hatch.  Often heritage chicken eggs need to be shipped thousands of miles to be shared between fellow breeders.  By understanding the principles of packing eggs for shipping, you can ensure they arrive  the best shape. 

If you do not want to develop your own way of packaging eggs to be mailed, in a series of photos and simple steps, you can follow and learn how to package fertilised chicken eggs for successful shipping.

Chicken Health Articles

Pretty Wheaten Ameraucana Chicken that Lays Blue Eggs

I plan to write more chicken health articles to help people treat and prevent sickness in their flock.  And also get rid of  that awful feeling of failure when your chickens get sick by giving  suggestions, tip and treatments you can do to help your birds. 

We have had experience with Fowl Pox, Coccidiosis, Mycosplasma and Infectious bronchitis in our free ranging flock.  Free range chickens will always have exposure to air and soil born poultry diseases.  Managing your flock well and giving them great space, shelter, ventilation and feed helps prevent a lot of these carried disease from developing in to the clinical or contagious form that you would see.  

I have photographs and images of our poultry flock with a milder fowl pox on my Easy Chickenry website, and information on what the disease it was like and how we dealt with it.  We had birds autopsied at the Guelph Pathologist lab and learned a lot about back yard poultry health at that time.

Organizing your poultry set-up and coops for prevention of coccidiosis will save a lots of heartbreak and losses.  We have been there and these things, although they take time, are not terribly expensive, and are often common-sense once you know how the disease works.

Last Word and Infobarrel Article for Chicken Owners

This is last article is just a bit of fun.  Chicken lovers can be quite eccentric and obsessed.  I guarantee anything you buy for the Chicken owner from this Chicken Christmas or Birthday gift list will be a hit!   As a chicken owner you can use this article as a wish list and make gift buying easier for your family.

If you want to learn more, I have much more information and other poultry, homesteading, recipes and lazy gardening articles on my Easy Chickenry chicken care website.