Feathered Friend Friday

Welcome to our series "Feathered Friend Friday." Every Friday I write a post with interesting facts, photos, or funny stories about our chickens and guineas. If you need to catch up, you'll find all the Feathered Friend Friday posts here.  

Which one of these is not like the other?

If you guessed the middle one, congratulations! Those feathered feet belong to one of our new pullets, a light brahma named Elspeth (Ellie) also known as Michelle Obrahma :)

At first I was kind of freaked out by the fact that she would have feathers on her feet, but now I really like it. She's such a beautiful girl with big bright eyes and gorgeous coloring.

 It's really interesting to learn about all the varieties of chickens and how some have weird and interesting quirks, like feathers on their feet. One type of chicken, the dorking, is a heritage breed that has five toes instead of four.

Photo via Moosicorn's Ranch on Flickr

And then there's the silkie. They also have five toes, but their feathers are far more interesting.

Photo via My Pet Chicken

We do plan to get some silkies when we get a flock of bantam chickens in the next year or two because, aside from being great cuddle buddies, they are known for being fabulous mothers. Apparently when a silkie goes broody, you can put any type of egg under her (duck, guinea, chicken) and she will hatch it and play mom. How cute is that?

For more funky chickens, check out this great article.

~Tammy