Anconas might be glamorous Italian fowls but they have a secret more people should know about – they’re pretty good layers as well as very good lookers. Ancona are attractive fowls that produce lots of lovely large white-shelled eggs. They tend to be kept...
Want some fresh turkey to cook for Christmas dinner, not frozen? Really fresh, like alive? Megg Miller has some tips you ought to read before you sharpen the axe. What’s on the menu for the oncoming Christmas celebrations? Some species of poultry have ‘festive...
When it comes to faking it, your backyard henhouse gets its fair share of cross-dressers, role reversals and good old sex scandals, says Megg Miller. You may know lots about poultry but there are some well-kept secrets in the henhouse. Take hen-feathered...
Megg Miller says lots of people fall in love with the look of a beautiful Light Sussex chook, and though it’s only a moderate egg-layer, it’s one of the best meat breeds you can find. It’s not mink or even faux fur but the distinct striped ‘collar’ on Light...
See one and you’ll fall in love. Megg Miller says Hamburgh chickens are the hot pick for fashionable backyard poultry keepers – and they’re good layers, too. Hamburghs are hot. They are such an engaging bird that once people see them they want them. Advice that...
How About Hens? Thinking of getting some backyard chooks but not sure what to do? Poultry expert Megg Miller has lots of tips on how to get set up and keep the girls laying happily. Everyone wants chooks (and why not?): they are entertaining, they convert greens...
Yes, you can have farm-fresh eggs even in a courtyard! Chook expert Megg Miller says there are small, docile chicken breeds perfect for very small areas. Could you keep a couple of hens if you’ve got just a teeny backyard? Would it be fair to the birds or must...
There really is a pecking order in every henhouse, and it’s worth your while to give the newcomers a hand, to help them settle in, says Megg Miller. With fowls it really is a girls’ world. Hens lay eggs regardless of whether a rooster is present and organise...
Docile, small and pretty, but not a great layer, the Pekin bantam is a great bird for kids, small backyards, beginners – or all three! Some fowls are elegant looking, some exotic but the Pekin bantam is reminiscent of a cuddly ball of feathers. You cannot go past this...
Spring is the time to start making babies in the henhouse, says Megg Miller. We mean baby chickens, of course! September is a great time to think about chickens. Littlies hatched now will be laying eggs for you before the days shorten next autumn. That means fresh...