This morning I was greeted in the chicken coop by a dead hen. It was the last of our original brown hens, she was a ripe old age and had been getting slower and slower and not venturing far for a little while now. In fact I had to put her to bed last night as she didn't seem able to climb the ladder. So it came as no surprise, poor chicken!
This now leaves us with three young birds, none of which are laying, in fact we've not had an egg for weeks now.
The jury is actually out on one of them as to whether is it a hen or cockerel . This Light Sussex has never laid an egg but equally it has never cook-a-doodle-do'd. It is quite a bit bigger than the two Marans and has started to run at my legs. If there are any experts out there here 'it' is, what do you think.
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5 comments:
If it helps, it looks like a chicken to me ;o))
Rob
Hi Debbie, We've kept chickens for some years, including rare breeds and it is hard to tell the difference sometimes! Checking our 'British Large Fowl' reference book, I'm sure you have a hen. The cock would appear to have larger wattles under the beak and a bigger comb - unless it's a very young bird of course! We've had cocks who haven't crowed and plenty of hens who haven't laid and maybe it just wants to peck some muck off your wellies! Hope this helps. Shirley & Robbie
looks like a hen to me - the feathers by the tail should droop down in a more majestic way if its rooster, i think ?!
How old is this chicken, we had a sussex that we thought was a hen, but turned out to be a cockeral! If it is a cockeral, the wattles will grow much better and the tail will become much bigger and longer. They may not be laying at the moment because the days are getting shorter. I know mine are not laying as many eggs as they did. Hope that helps.
Hen !!....they need about 9 hours of daylight to keep laying !!....It looks like a Light Sussex Hen to me !!...I have one just like it !!....Ive had both cockerals and hens..she looks like a hen to me !!......Jayne
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