Our Poultry Page two

Ron & Sue Wall's Poultry Page - devoted to one of our hobbies - Pictures of our Ameraucanas, Silkies, Japanese Bantams and other assorted chickens - page 2

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This is Sky, Sue's blue splash Silky hen. Typical of Silkies, she is very tame and gentle.	Another picture of Sky. One of my neighbors calls Silkies, Phyllis Dillers because of the crown of feathers that makes them look like they have a permanent bad hair day.
Silkies have several unique features other than the fur like feathers. They have five toes rather than the usual four, two of which are on the rear of the foot and serve no purpose other than perhaps balance; they usually have a knobby comb (enlarge the picture for a better view) and they have fluffy feathered legs. Their legs and feet are always a slate gray color.	Sky's feathers have a bluish tint and her skin is blue-gray. She has bright blue ear lobes. In this picture she has been taking a dust bath and the pretty white hair on her head is a bit dirty. Silkies are oriental chickens and one of the oldest chicken breeds. It is believed that they were originally from China.
This is Curly, our Bantam Cochin Frizzle cockerel. Also in the picture at left is Cesar, a six month old cockerel that was bantam and Ameraucana mix. Between my thumb and finger you can see the head of Roadie (short for Roadrunner), a Silky, Japanese bantam mix. She resembles the Arizona roadrunners that hang out at our place. As of November 2009 she is one of our longer living hens still laying after two years.	Curly is about five months old in this picture and had not yet begin to crow, but was almost full grown. Frizzles have feathers almost like a Silky's but are "frizzy," hence the name. The feathers are soft and curly (hence his name) but brittle. The pullet on the right is the sister to Roadie. She resembles Roadie in every aspect except that she does not have the crown of feathers that makes Roadie look like a roadrunner. Both hens are the same age (born a day or two apart) and are still laying in November 2009
The lady we purchased Curly from had several large Ameraucana roosters who liked to pick on poor little Curly. She put Curly in a cage to separate him from the roosters. The stress caused Curly to pluck out his back, tail and wing feathers. We have had him a few weeks and the feathers are coming back in rapidly. The black and white chick to the right is an Ameraucana named Trey (the third of three chicks we bought together). Next to Trey is Duey (the second of three, of course), a mix, we think, of a Cochin Frizzle and possibly Ameraucana. We lost "Uno" to stress the first night we had her.	"Ladies and gentleman, can I have your attention please..." Left to right, we have Cesar, near Cesar's tail is a four month old pullet that is a mix of Japanese Bantam and Ameraucana, Roadie, on the podium Roadie's sister pullet and at far right is a four month old mix Silky and Japanese Bantam pullet.
Of course, there is always a heckler in the crowd!	Roadrunner and Cesar. Roadie lacks the long tail of a roadrunner but she has much the same markings. Cesar's feathers have a beautiful purple to blue-green sheen to them when he is in the full sun (click on picture for a larger image). Cesar also has a splash of blood red feathers.
Two young Ameraucana pullets (about sever or eight weeks old)	Trey, Our youngest Ameraucana chick (cockerel).
An Ameraucana (left) and two "Rhode Island" Red pullets. The reds are our most productive egg layers. Ameraucana chicks can usually be identified by their "chipmunk" faces, puffy feathers on the cheeks. They have slate gray legs. When grown, they tend to be larger than the other standard sized birds.	This is one of the wild doves that like to hang out with the flock. They know that a couple times a day I throw out feed for the chickens. They also seem to realize that I'm usually the source of the food and sometimes allow me to get quite close. This is a Mourning Dove. We also have ringed neck Turtle Doves, Gambel Quail, curved bill Thrashers and a variety of sparrows.
These are links to a couple of excellent poultry web sites The Feather Site Henderson's Chicken Breed Chart
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