Agnes is our oldest chicken, and technically belongs to my friend Kim. The roosters are in love with her-hence the bald spot. Bad boys. She's a Black Sex-link and even though she's several years old is still a prolific layer of some of the biggest brown eggs I've ever seen.
Here's an Agnes egg next to an "extra large" egg from the store. I think Aggie wins this round.
Next up we have Peggy, our Easter Egger. Easter Eggers are often confused with Araucanas, but Araucanas are a standardized breed whereas Easter Eggers are more of a 'type' of bird who lay colored eggs. Peggy has green legs and a lovely little beard, and routinely give us lovely teal-colored eggs.
Much more exciting than those store-bought white ones, right?
This demure little thing is Izzie, my Old English Game bantam hen. She weighs about a pound and fits in my hand pretty easily. This is assuming you can catch her. It doesn't happen often. She's not actively laying right now but when she does, I'm always impressed. Given her diminutive size she gives us some big eggs!
This came out of that little bird. Show some respect!
Izzie's near-constant companion and undisputed ruler of the roost is Mateo, a Dutch Booted bantam. Everything you've ever heard about bantam roosters is absolutely true. He's a third of the size of our other roo but is absolutely the boss. He fears nothing!
And that leaves us with Hank. Hank is massive. And a massive wuss. He can't even hit on any of the girls because Mateo won't share any of his action. He's a Buff Orpington/Cuckoo Marans cross and absolutely gentle. Good thing too, because he's certainly big enough to do some damage.
Right now all of our birds live together in one coop, but once the tractor is done Izzie and Mateo will move in there and be my backyard/garden helpers. I would ideally like to have one more large hen, but we'll see how that goes.
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