Plymouth Rock Chickens

I have a variety of different breeds, but my barred Plymouth rock lays by far and away the best egg. It is not only beautiful to look at - a delicate pink - but also tastes far richer and is deeper yellow than all my other eggs, athough she has the same range. She is big and so smart with her black and white stripes and shining feathers, and is probably my best-natured with all the other birds. She is quite talkative with a gentle voice and is a lovely placid, easy going bird. Definitely one of my favourites.

A good layer and a all round nice bird I would recommend this to everybody how want chicken's.

The hens are great layers, I love their yellow eggs! Big downside: our Barred Rock rooster attacked me when I was 3. Before I got away, he pecked me more than 80 times on my head and neck, especially around my eyes, and he broke my nose. We found out later that the males can be quite defensive and territorial, so since then we only have the hens. I rated the friendliness as poor, but because the disparity in friendliness between the male and female is great, no rating would be true of the other sex. If you have small children with shiny, bright eyes, you don't want the male Barred Rock around.

One of these was in my hedge having escaped from my neighbour where it lived there for 6 weeks before I could catch it. It now lives happily with 3 larger hens and lays about 4/5 eggs a week but despite having it's wing clipped it can still get into trees and can clear a 4 foot fence. It is very independent and feisty and is the best flyer as when I call it flies 3/4 metres stops then does the same again.

I initially added the Barred Plymouth Rock to my flock because my husband loved their coloring. I'm very happy I added them because they are a unique and wonderful addition to a backyard flock. Of the two Barred Rocks I have, one (Loretta) was the flock leader from day one. It was apparent to me during the first week of raising them from chicks. She was bold, assertive, and all the others followed her. She was clearly my strongest hen. Loretta was also the first to go broody (an indication of your strongest hen), and stayed that way for weeks despite my attempts to break her "cycle." Otherwise, she lays a beautiful large light brown egg, quite consistently. Rocks are an easily-handled bird, and can be very docile. I wouldn't call mine overly sweet, but they are certainly tame birds that I would recommend to anyone. As far as the roosters go, I don't have any, so I can't speak from personal experience. However, all of my friends who have kept Rock roosters claim them to be the best protectors of the flock, and very tame if handled often, and raised with consistent handling.