Chicken Genetics
We started out with three breeds of chickens here:
- Buff Orpington
- Polish Silver Laced
- Sicilian Buttercup
Our chickens free range during the day, so we don’t dictate what rooster breeds what hen. They decide that all for themselves. 
That means that sometimes the genetics produce some interesting results.
Take a rooster that was a cross of Buff Orpington hens. . .
And a Polish Silver Laced Rooster, and you get a rooster that looks close to the original, but still carries some different genes.
Now let him breed with a Sicilian Buttercup hen. . .
And you end up with this handsome fellow. . .
We’ve also ended up with a lot of all white chickens, and other variations like Peepers. . .
And as usual, I’m waiting to see how many of this year’s chicks are going to turn out to be roosters. It seems to me that there are always more roosters than hens. What’s with that? With two adult roosters, I probably have one rooster too many anyway!
But it’s a lot of fun seeing which genetics come home to roost!
