The Rhode Island Reds
These ARE your Grandmother's chickens
History
Did you know that the Rhode Island Red you're familiar with is probably not a real Rhode Island Red? Odds are pretty good you've never laid eyes on a true Rhode Island Red as the APA standards describe.
In the 1940's, production egg farms decided to take a shortcut to "improve" the Rhode Island Red by crossing it with the New Hampshire Red in an effort to create a more prolific egg layer. Instead of giving these crossbreeds a distinctly different name, the hatcheries continued to market the hybrids as Rhode Island Reds. Today's production line hybrid Rhode Island Reds have a lighter body color, smaller frames, and much different conformation. They are much less of a dual purpose bird than the Rhode Island Red that is bred to the original APA standards. The production line Rhode Island Red roosters also have a reputation for nasty dispositions.
Nostalgia Meets Beauty
Our line of Rhode Island Reds are known as the Mohawk/Reese line. The history of this specific bloodline dates back to 1928. This strain has been carefully curated by only a handful of breeders for almost 100 years. We feel honored to be entrusted with our small well-dispositioned flock and will continue to uphold the standards that have been set forth by the American Poultry Association and the breeders that have preceded us.
Pictured is Cluck, the 2 year old patriarch of our Rhode Island Red flocks.
The Bielefelder
The peace-loving uber chicken
History
The Bielefelder is a breed of chicken developed near Bielefeld, Germany in the 1970's. They were introduced to the United States in 2011. The breed has slowly gained recognition and popularity among chicken keepers interested in dual purpose birds.
The Perfect Chicken?
The Bielefelder is one of only a handful of auto-sexing breeds - pullets and cockerels are born with distinctly different colors at hatch. Pullet chicks are light brown with dark brown dorsal stripes and black eyeliner. Cockerel chicks should be yellow ochre with light brown dorsal stripes and a clearly visible white head spot.
Bielefelder hens should lay around 220 extra large to jumbo size eggs per year and are known for their winter hardiness. They do not tend to go broody, but when they do, are usually excellent mothers. Thanks to their terra cotta colored eggs, crossing Bielefelder with blue egg layers are said to produce layers of dramatically colored green eggs.
Bielefelder are excellent free-rangers, and their primitive coloring helps them blend in with their environment to avoid predators.
The roosters are particularly known for their docile temperaments and the standard calls for them to mature at nearly 9 pounds. Despite the Bielefelder size, they are prone to being harassed by more aggressive breeds.
The Bielefelder is not an American Poultry Association (APA) recognized breed due in part to its lack of establishment in America. We strive to adhere to the German Standard of Perfection. Waylon, our young Bielefelder cockerel, is one of the best specimens you can find. He and his hens are of the same excellent stock. Common faults in the American Bielefelder lines include black coloration in the breast on either sex, black coloring on the back of the head for hens, solid white tail feathers on roosters, and a lack of barring in hens (especially in the tail) - just to name a few. Commercial hatchery stock is fraught with these faults and disqualifications. See our blog post for the German breed standard.
Pictured is Waylon, our young Bielefelder cockerel, who has been an absolute pleasure to have here on the farm.
The Splash Ameraucana
Quirky, yet endearing
What is a Splash Ameraucana?
The Splash Ameraucana is basically a black Ameraucana with two copies of a dilution gene. A single copy of the dilution gene on a black bird produces blue. Two copies result in the splash coloration. The Splash Ameraucana gained formal recognition by the American Poultry Association in 2023. They are the 10th accepted color variety of Ameraucana on the APA books.
What to expect of a Splash Ameraucana
Ameraucanas are a soft feathered breed, with the feathers being held loosely from the body. Ameraucana youngsters are softer than cotton! The Splash Ameraucana are exciting to watch grow up, as their colors develop more by the day. Their cheek feathers (referred to as muffs), make it difficult to for them to see things from certain angles, so they frequently tilt their heads in the most adorable ways. Their pea combs make them tough to sex early on, and the breed standard calls for no wattles, or very small wattles. Like other breeds, the cockerel's combs will likely darken ahead of the pullets, but there are always those late bloomers! Often you will have to wait until they are 8-9 weeks old and inspect the saddle feathers in front of the tail for solid evidence of sex. Splash Ameraucana also tend to have sexually dimorphic plumage, with males having darker heads, necks and saddle feathers than the females. Ameraucanas are a slow maturing breed. Pullets are not likely to lay eggs earlier than 6 months. Cockerels continue to mature up to around 10 months. With sufficient early handling, Ameraucanas are a very friendly breed. They are very intelligent and food motivated.
Breeding Splash to Splash results in 100% Splash offspring, so the variety does breed true. These birds lay around 200 medium to large blue eggs per year.
Pictured is one of our most handsome young Splash Ameraucana cockerels at 16 weeks.
See our blog post, "What You Need To Know About Buying Ameraucanas" for more information on the pitfalls of the Ameraucana Breed!
The Ayam Cemani
Wicked cool & intelligent
History
The TRUE Ayam Cemani (pronounced I-am-chee-mon-e) originates from the Indonesian island of Java. This breed possesses a characteristic called fibromelanism, in addition to several other dermal and plumage melanizers, giving them their exotic look. Ayam Cemanis are believed to bring health, good luck, and fertility to their people in Indonesia, and are a treasured breed.
Let The Buyer Beware (Caveat Emptor)!
There are VERY FEW quality specimens of Ayam Cemani in the United States. Almost all of the Ayam Cemani in the US arrived here via Europe, where the breed purity was compromised through efforts to increase egg production. Indonesia has banned exportation of chickens from their country, and even if that ban was lifted, the USDA bans importation of chickens from Indonesia due to the risk of highly pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI) from that country.
Our Ayam Cemani rooster is named Chaos. Chaos is undeniably not a good representative of his breed. Ayam Cemani should not have any color leakage in their feathers. They should have all black toes and toenails. Check the skin color under the wing, in the vent and especially inside the mouth - ideally there is no pink anywhere! Comb should be 5 points, upright, with no purple tint in the comb or wattles. Conformation should be long legged, lean, and upright like a gamebird. A level back carriage is undesirable.
Our Chaos has gold leakage in his hackle feathers, mulberry colored comb and wattles, the inside of his mouth and his tongue is pink, and his conformation tends more toward a layer breed than it should. For these reasons, we will not attempt to breed Chaos for pure Cemani chicks, nor will we sell Cemani hatching eggs.
Great, Now What?
Chaos will be used as the sire of our Zombie chickens and Fibromelanistic Easter Eggers for the 2024 season. Stay tuned for some exciting hatches from this pen!