Someone asked me the other day how my “tiny” chicken breeding plan was coming along.
Friend: “How’s the tiny chicken breeding plan going?”
Me: “Okay…. I mean, like total shit really. Unless you like roosters.”
My tiny chickens they were referring to are so-called Serama chickens. But after doing some research, which has been completely maddening with all the conflicting information, I can’t really be sure my chickens are Seramas after all, and might instead be Japanese Bantams? I have no clue at this point, but i’m leading towards the Japanese Bantam. It’s so confusing.
I was given a breeding pair a few years ago by some Spanish guy who barely spoke any English and couldn’t tell me what they were, in English anyway. I’ve tried like crazy to hatch some eggs in the incubator three times now and all I have to show for it is two mature roosters and “Pia” a 2.5 month-old rooster.
These birds are so hard to hatch (for me anyway). My single female hen lays eggs sporadically and tends to hide them all over the place. I’m entirely ready to give up on trying to build a small flock of these birds. I really am.
But they’re cute. They make great house pets. Kids love them. They’re extremely docile – including the roosters. And although I’ve never eaten one, I bet they taste great with all that meaty-breasted chest of theirs.
“Pia”, the youngest rooster, was born on August 12th. Pia is working on his “crowing” skills at this stage of life. Or maybe Pia is mimicking the sounds from my other house-rooster’s crowing. Can chickens do that? I don’t know, but since Pia is the only chick to hatch from eight eggs, maybe he has nothing better to do than mimic another rooster crowing. Pia is all alone in a cage by himself.
But don’t feel bad – that little rotten bird is let out of its cage all the time to hang out with dogs, cats and people. He’s not in total solitary confinement or anything horrid like that… he’s just too small to go outside with the other roosters yet.
So now I have three little roosters and one hen. At the moment things are looking pretty dire for my tiny chicken plan. ~A
