Get your wife some chickens

I recommend Silver Laced Wyandottes for generally friendly and easy to keep birds. http://www.foleyswaterfowl.com/

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I had heard that, but it was not my experience. I’m just not good at handling them. I have a mille fleur bantam I named slippers (for her feet) which is the sweetest ever. Her eggs are small but give me a smile every time I eat one.

How funny that every chicken coop looks the same.:wink:
We do have Orpington @subdood_ky_z6b and are very happy with their character, less with their laying. But since you want buff orpington and we have black-gold, chocolate (and a colour I don’t know the name in english) I’m not sure you can take my results and apply them to the buff orpingtons.
Originally I wanted them as a dual purpose breed but now I think they aren’t the best layers. They are very seasonally affected, they don’t like snow and wet weather at all.
If it’s dark in winter they don’t lay at all, compared with brown leghorn that reduce their laying somewhat but not completely.
But in good weather they are foraging very widely, if you let them. They are very good in finding grubs to eat. In fall and winter we let them go everywhere so they can eat slugs and bugs in my mothers vegetable garden.
They are very docile and calm, but at the same time the cockerel is always watchful, warning about every crow overhead. They cope well with my cats and the dog, standing their ground if they come too close. In fact if they have the chance they chase the cats away to eat the catfood themselves :rofl:

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That’s funny about them running off the Katzen to get their food, brave chickens!

Thanks for the info on the Orpington’s and their reluctance to set in the winter. From what I hear quite a few breeds don’t lay much when the days get shorter and colder.

@moose71 I think has chickens and is in a cold climate, curious to hear how his chickens act in winter.

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If I wanted egg production, I would get some Buckeye or Chantecler chicks. They do open range and still produce about 200 eggs per hen per year.

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So i went to the source on dekalb hybrids in the USA and received a very helpful response very quickly. They sell in millions or thousands of birds since they are what commercial farms tend to use. I asked about the guy who wants small quantity of 100 or less of their birds

From: Eugene Fridman <Eugene.Fridman@hendrix-genetics.com>
Date: Wed, Feb 19, 2020, 9:44 AM
Subject: HG layers

Good morning Sir,

Thank you very much for your interest in Hendrix Genetics layers.

Dekalb White is one of the popular products that we sell in the US.

We have large hatcheries in various states that sell this layer. However quantities that they sell are quite large.

If you want to buy smaller number of birds I would suggest to contact our distributor Townline hatchery in Michigan.

They could send by mail smaller number of birds. They have from us – ISA Brown (lay brown eggs); Dekalb Amberlink (lay brown eggs) and Shaver White (lay white eggs).

Townline hatchery contact information: Tel. 616-772-6514

Best regards,

Eugene Fridman

Area Manager North America

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Thanks, I’ll keep Dekalb’s in mind whenever we decide to get some chickens.

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@subdood_ky_z6b
You will be shocked at the difference.

my wife has crohn’s so my relatives(myself included) try to give her all manner of foodstuff to help her gain weight, and below is what my sis sent her. Came in packaged with a customized memory foam. It really is more oily than chicken eggs, and when hard-boiled, the albumin is more firm and the yolk is thicker and denser in texture

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Oh, man. Duck eggs are my favorite! So much better for baking (except meringues). I want to get a laying breed of ducks, but I don’t think they’re allowed where I am. The city I’m in passed an ordinance that made chickens explicitly allowed in more yards, but now all other livestock aren’t allowed except in areas zoned rural, if I read the ordinance correctly. You win some, you lose some.

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while bobby fischer ( the one-man wrecking ball vs the soviet chess machine) was hiding in the philippines from uncle sam, not only did he eat plenty duck eggs, but he was so addicted to incubated duck eggs in which an embryo already developed. He was said to have eaten 4 or 5 boiled embryonated duck eggs daily, which is a bit too rich for anyone’s arteries…

“where chickens are outlawed, only outlaws will have chickens

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I’ll toss my 2 cents in here on the chicken breed topic. I’ve had a variety of chickens, mostly obtained as gifts from moving neighbors, Australopes, buff orps, and various others. No one breed stood out as great, until recently I actually purchased some replacement laying hens which were red star breed. Red stars are a sex linked breed, in that the males and females have different coloration, so you can easily separate out the hens. Well these ladies are just amazing, they out lay any other hens we’ve ever had. They are rugged and I often find them out in the snow when I head out to shovel off the coop area and their ramp. Have not had them long enough to say how they will do in the long run, but unless something changes I will be sticking with this breed in the future.

Should add, they are probably not plump/big enough to make for a good meat chicken, but for egg production they can’t be beat.

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My red stars are prolific layers as well. They are also pretty fearless. I get on my Cushman ATV and they jump up on the seat beside me as I roll through the yard. I have several, but to me they are all Henrietta :blush:

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Maybe you could claim ignorance on the difference between a duck and a chicken. They lay eggs, have feathers, 2 feet …looked like chickens based off description to me. What is the difference sir? It might work better if you offer them a dozen chicken eggs and thank them for stopping by. Honestly zoning in chickens but not ducks seems kind of weird.

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It is, but it’s actually an overall improvement. Before this ordinance, the only requirements for livestock were that they not be roaming the streets and that they need housed at least 40 feet from a house. The 40’ made it de facto illegal in a lot of town. The lack of specificity meant that if someone is dumb enough and had the right spacing of houses, theoretically they could keep goats, cattle, etc in small lots so long as they had the 40’. Backyard chicken enthusiasts advocated for a change, and now chickens are allowed as an accessory use in all zones so long as it’s not out front and at least 20’ from the property line, and you can build a fully enclosed coop and run. No one went to bat for ducks, so it was written very narrowly for chickens.

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i have a dime sized scar on the back of my leg from a silver laced wynadotte rooster that attacked me with his spurs while i was collecting eggs. took months for it to heal. he didn’t survive the encounter. :wink:

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they act the same but on really cold days they stay high upon the roosts and huddle together. with 25 birds my egg laying goes down to 4-5 a day in dec… ducks and geese don’t lay at all. ducks and geese stay outside until it gets to -20f or colder, then they will go in. they lay on the snow with their feet tucked into their feathers and their head tucked under a wing. tough birds!

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i added 4 isa browns from TSC last spring. impressive layers of large brown eggs. they are a hybrid of r.i red and r.i whites i believe.

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My little Indian Runners go outside until about -25C, they love it. When we get warm winter days I have a pile of straw with a low rubber feeder filled with water, they run to get in to have a splash then spend the rest of the time grooming and chattering. They are sure entertaining.

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there is a hybrid 300 duck sold for commercial egg laying. it lays over 300 eggs a year. there are a few hatcheries that have them. as my chicken age ill probably replace them with these.

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