Frequently Asked Questions

The answer to that question will depend on exactly how large the hens and roosters in question may be as well as what your personal preference is. No matter the size of your rooster, he will try to mate all your hens, whether they are large fowl or bantams, so it's certainly a valid concern! Look at the difference in size between a large fowl cochin and a bantam cochin: If you have a very large rooster like a Jersey Giant paired with very small bantams like Sebrights, you might see some injuries during mating since he will be so...

Yes, dogs can be pretty gross sometimes, can't they? They are not the most discriminating of eaters. For instance, my friend's dog likes to raid the cat box, find rabbit droppings, and even eat his own doggie poo! So, dogs eating feces is not confined only to chicken poo. Your dog could conceivably get sick from any of these sources because feces of any kind can be contaminated with bacteria. If you want to train your dog not to eat that icky stuff, you might try a week or two of going out into the yard first before he does,...

There are challenges associated with mixing fowl varieties, such as making sure each one eats the right food for their needs. Often different fowl have different nutritional requirements, so sometimes they won't be healthy if they all eat the same food. Will you offer them all layer feed for chickens, feed designed for your other fowl, or something else entirely that is a compromise between the two? It may be hard to find something they can all eat that will keep them all at their best when their care needs are so different. Ducks, geese, guineas, peafowl, quail, pheasants, turkeys...

There is no one special breed that lays double yolkers. Occasionally a hen may lay a double yolker when her ovaries release two yolks at once, rather than one at a time. This tends to happen more often when hens are young and have just begun laying. Any breed can lay a double yolked egg, but it may be more common from breeds that are good layers, like Rhode Island Reds, Sussex, and Leghorns. Double yolkers are a favorite for over easy eggs! Commercially, most double yolkers will be discarded as "irregular" when candling, so getting farm fresh eggs from...

Our breeding flocks are very large. We can't know which chicks hatch from which eggs. Even if we could, we don't keep track of which hen laid which egg, and we can't know which rooster fertilized which eggs, either. However, if you purchase birds from My Pet Chicken or some other major hatchery, generally speaking you can probably presume that the flocks are large enough to breed your birds together at home. Hatcheries understand that's what people want to do, so they keep breeding flocks with plenty of genetic diversity for breeding future generations. If you purchase birds from a...

Eggs from your own hens normally have very "tall" yolks because they can be so very fresh! It's not because they are pasture raised, though. The nutritional content for your own eggs when your hens have access to pasture is much better than regular "grocery store eggs." You can visually observe the difference between eggs from hens raised on pasture and eggs from factory farmed birds, because pasture raised birds will have yolks that are dark and orange, as opposed to the sickly pale yellow of grocery store eggs. Notice that in the photo above? That's the natural color of...

|It really depends on the individual personality of the bird as well as how quickly they develop. Birds that feather out quickly may begin to roost early (if they have a roost to use), since the grown-in wing feathers allow them to fly up to the roost easily. Some may try roosting almost immediately, while others may take two or three weeks. Most people don't put roosts in their brooders, in which case it may take a few weeks for older birds to figure out "roosting" when they are moved to the big girl coop. However, you can give your...

There is no special size that is best across all breeds. Think about it: some breeds lay very large eggs because the chicks are comparatively large; some bantam breeds may have tiny eggs, and the chicks that hatch from those eggs are tiny. Hens of vastly different sizes lay different sizes of eggs. In fact, there are some large fowl breeds that lay small eggs, too... so the size of the egg you want to use for hatching depends on the breed. If that's the case, how do you know which fertile eggs are best to hatch? Choose eggs that...