The other day, as I was writing about how much I love my Wyandottes, I had a thought. “I wonder how many different breeds I’ve kept over the last eight years? A lot. I should make a list and count.”

My husband often jokes that I never do anything by half measures. When I embark on a new hobby, I throw myself straight into the deep end every time. I mean, who wouldn’t, right? It’s so FUN to immerse oneself!

When I started keeping chickens I chose as many breeds as I could lay my hands on. I wanted all the chickens. They were so different from one another! Not just in looks and number of eggs laid. Chicken breeds are like dog breeds, their members share characteristics. Some breeds are loud and demanding (ugh, Ancona! I can’t abide a noisy chicken), while others are so quiet and self-effacing (Cochin, Orpington) that I almost forget they’re there. Some are skittish (yes Legbars, I’m talking about you!) and some are stoic (Marans). Some are as dumb as posts (coughpolishcough). Some are photogenic (Swedes). And some are as smart as a two year old child (Wyandottes).

So I made my list, and found out that as of today, I’m up to exactly 44 chicken breeds. That’s when my superstitious side’s jaw hit the floor, because four is my favourite number!

I was born on the 4th, I have four immediate family members (besides me), my address and license plate have lots of fours, I took pictures when my odometer hit 4444, and 44,444 and 144,444. Four is my lucky number. I joke about this often, pointing out auspicious fours here and there, and choosing them in preference to other numbers when minor decisions involving numbers need to be made. So how weird is that?  I’m telling you… I couldn’t make this stuff up!

After the happy shock of finding 44 breeds on my list, I did some more figuring. Right now in my pens, I have 21 breeds. Seven pens of the breeds I like best (currently Wyandottes, Silkies, Swedish Flowers, Cream Legbars, Marans, Olive and Easter Eggers and Barnevelders) and fourteen breeds in “the laying flock”, all leftovers from various chicken breed trials.

I still want to try all the chickens (there are more than 200 breeds available in Canada) and I’m getting better at choosing now. These days, when I see an online auction for something new that might be fun, I study the pictures with a critical eye. How does the parent stock compare to their breed’s SOP (Standard of Perfection)? Do they and their quarters look happy and clean? How do their eggs size up and are they reasonably mud-free? 

And then more practical considerations, like do I have room for another breed? Why do I want to try this one? How well does it produce? And just how far away are these eggs? Newfoundland or Alberta, the distance the eggs have to travel makes a huge difference to how well they are likely to hatch.

I don’t know if I will try any new breeds this year, the status quo (and the number 44) seems alright to me. But I may be tempted, something interesting could come up. 

I am going to be very careful though, because if chicken breed #45 is anything like US President #45, I am better off doing what I bet a lot of folks wish they could have done in 2016…stuck with #44! 😉

Some hens never feel the need to raise a family, while other hens do and are great mothers. Then there are the “wanna-be’s”, who feel the urge but do a poor job of executing. They’re just a pain.

A proven broody is a valuable commodity around our muddy valley. Not only does she do all the work, she will usually accept any number of extra chicks quietly slipped under her after dark. As those of you who have spent any time at all scraping stinky chick poop out of basement brooders will agree, that’s a real plus!

Non-broody hens are pretty fine too, they don’t take time off like broodies do, they just keep popping out those delicious farm fresh eggs. In fact, I prefer that most of my hens be non-broody. I only need so many, especially because I find it impossible to say no to a wanna-be.

People “break” broodies all the time – discouraging them until they give up the idea of motherhood entirely. They house broodies in breezy wire cages hung from the ceiling, to cool off their nether regions; or plunge them in cool water several times a day. But I can never bring myself to deliberately break a brood. It just seems unfair to me, to let some hens raise families and others not. Every hen should have the opportunity to fulfill her procreative purpose.

I doubt the chickens have as keen a sense of justice and equality as I do, but the wanna-be’s certainly benefit from my impracticality on this subject. A tried and true crazy chicken lady, I give everyone a chance. Or two.

A couple weeks ago, two year old Welsummer hen went broody for the first time. I already had more than a dozen hens either setting or raising young, plus I know that older wanna-be’s are often extra hopeless, but I pushed away my reservations and set her up anyway on a few Legbar and Marans eggs. She stuck like glue for the first twelve days, but started to get restless over the weekend. Today when I opened her broody box to feed and water, she flew the coop.

There was a chance she only wanted to stretch her legs, to escape for a little sun like Daisy Mae in Dr. Seuss’s ‘Horton Hatches the Egg’, and that she’d return to her eggs after her holiday. But the broody box is a restricted entry facility, so I carefully moved her eggs next door to an open nest box. Maybe that would tempt her back to what she had already invested two weeks in. I knew the eggs would likely be fine no matter how much she dithered, I have seen hens let half-baked eggs get cold for up to 24 hours in mid-winter, and still got a decent hatch. Chickens are pretty amazing that way.

Hours later I returned to find Welsummer still hanging out in the sun, casually flipping dust through her feathers with her pal Lavender Orpington. “Well that’s that, she isn’t interested” I thought, feeling bad for the poor little chicks still a week away from hatch. But when I peeked into the nest box, there WAS a broody hen diligently setting on those eggs, my half-pint Tiny Chicken, an OEGB no bigger than a pigeon.

With a look of intent concentration on her little face, she had flattened herself out to her utmost to cover those six eggs. That’s when I remembered that Tiny had been trying to set the past few days, but having no spare box to set her up in, I had been in denial about my little broody #14, and just kept scooping her up off whatever eggs she had gathered that day and setting her down outside the coop.

“Well,” I thought, “awesome, it looks like Tiny has saved the day,” and I carefully moved the eggs, and then Tiny, over into the broody box. An experienced mama, Tiny settled down right away again, the good little thing.

Tonight I candled, and removed two quitters, leaving her with a more manageable four eggs. In about a week, if all goes well, Tiny should get her reward!