What is Your Favorite Backyard Chicken Breed?

Reader Contribution by Heidi Hunt
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There are chickens and then there are CHICKENS! The modern factory-farmed chicken breed is a Leghorn. That breed’s ability to become broody and set a clutch of eggs to hatching stage has just about been bred out of them. Chickens that are hatched in incubators, as factory-farmed chickens are, do not need to know how to incubate and care for a brood of chicks.

However, most of the heritage breeds of chickens, those breeds that have been successful free rangers for generations, make great moms. There are also some poultry breeds that produce a slightly higher egg count per year, those that are easier to tame and others that seem to be especially good alarmists when danger approaches.

If you are keeping a small flock of chickens in your backyard or on a small acreage, tell us which breeds you have come to admire and why, in the comments section below.

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