Meet Bets

This is Bets. She’s the newest addition to our flock. She came to live with us last Saturday.

As you may remember, we started our little backyard flock just over three years ago with five day-old Buff Orpingtons. Well, I’m sad to say we lost one of them a couple weeks back. It was a sad day for us, and it absolutely broke our hearts to see the other hens mourning her.

I figured it would be a while before we were able to replace her, but fate intervened. A few days after we lost our hen, my friend Cathy called to ask if I would be interested in taking in another hen. I told her possibly, but it would have to be the right fit.

We have a laid back flock, and I didn’t want to throw that off. Buff Orpingtons are just chill birds. They like children; they like to be held and petted; and they do well in the city.

And as it turns out, so does Bets.

Bets is a Brahma, which is an heirloom breed with ties to Asia. Brahmas are known for being big birds with a calm temperament. They love to be held, and are often referred to as Gentle Giants. They’re good layers, too, and will even lay during the winter months. So, really, Brahmas have all the characteristics that we appreciate in our Buff Orpingtons – they just look quite a bit different.

We invited her for a visit last Saturday, and she ended up staying. Isn’t she gorgeous? Her feathers have a green iridescent quality. Very pretty.

and she has fancy feathered-feet, too.

Bet’s just turned one in May, so she’s about two years younger than the rest of our flock.

And I think her integration into the flock is going about as well as you could hope. One of our hens wasn’t too happy about the newcomer. She squawked about it almost continually for the first two days, but we haven’t had any feather pulling or other such mean girl activities. They’ll sometimes try to run her off, if they think she’s found something good to eat in the yard, but we were able to put her in the coop the first night, and that’s huge. We had expected that to take a few days.

So, it looks like we’ve found the perfect addition to our little flock. Bets is one sweet girl.

Want to Learn More About Keeping Chickens and Our Flock?

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