I thought I’d introduce you to the farm. Here’s an introduction to the fussiest chickens on the block.

Introducing Flo

Flo is your bog standard Warren egg layer. Warren is a brand name relating to a breed of chicken also known as ISA Brown but let’s face it ‘ISA Brown’ is hardly something you want to call your chick. This breed was bred for it’s egg laying and is used alot within the UK egg laying industry. She lays one egg a day at the height of the season.   

Introducing Ivy

Ivy is an Amber Star being white with brown bits (or is that brown with white bits?). She seems to lay the biggest eggs of the trio. This is an assumption on our part as it’s hard to know which chicken lays which egg, but we think she pops them out larger than the rest. As is the case with other Amber Stars she can be a bit of a nutter. She once tried to climb up me by clawing on to my jeans and flapping, only falling off when she got to my belt. While the others are pecking for insects, Ivy tends to be found running her beak side to side along the chicken wire. Not to be messed with !

Introducing Ethel

Ethel is another ISA-Brown Warren. She’s probably the Alpha-Hen of the group, given her reaction to the new arrivals today. In general she’s the most docile, perhaps it’s a karma thing, perhaps it comes from being the boss. Like Flo she’s a good layer, with around 330 eggs a year dropping out.

The new arrivals

Introducing Gladys

Introducing Queeny

Today we took delivery of our two new ladys. A quick trip to South Mead Poultry near Leatherhead on a Saturday morning gave us something to do, and they had a whole load of choice. In the end we got two. Queeny, a Bovan Nera and Gladys, a Maran Cuivre. We’ve only just got them, so I don’t have a lot of information about either yet, but all I know is that Queeny (the Bovan) looks like something from a superhero film and Gladys (the Maran) is meant to lay rich dark brown/red eggs, albeit not many of them. The Bovan is meant to be a more productive layer and so should be a good mix of design and function (something I’m sure will make many of my clients happy).

I’ll post some more delightfully dull stuff about the new ladys when I get a chance.

O.