Hen / Rooster

The hen and the rooster belong to gallinaceous birds, several representatives of which can be found in the wild: wood grouse, hazel hen, pheasant (in the forests), partridge, and quail (in the fields). But none of them is their ancestor.

In the impassable forests in Southeast Asia even today can found 3-4 species wild chickens as big as pigeons which are their closest relatives. Particularly similar to our roosters is the Bankivski rooster, which lives in the Indian jungle. Of course, this wild rooster and wild hen fly very well. At dusk they land on the trees and spend the night on them. At dawn they get down to search for food.

The domestication of the chickens happened probably 5-6 thousand years ago. At first they were raised as sacred birds and their killing was strictly prohibited.

Today we know more than 200 breeds of domestic chickens. The small hen the Bregovska dzhinka and Bantam are real midgets – their weight is 0,5kg. Very beautiful are the big crested breeds and their crest resemble a cap on their heads. The roosters of the Phoenix and Yokohama Bantan breeds have 5 – 6m long tails.

Especially important for us are the valuable economic qualities of the poultry. The big clumsy hens and roosters of the Cornish breed do not lay many eggs (100-150 eggs per year), therefore their weight is up to 5-6kg. The best egg layers are of Leghorn breed – they lay up to 250 eggs per year and also some record holders lay up to 360 eggs.

The more important chickens are of mixed “meat-egg” type – they lay about 200 eggs and weight approximately 3kg. These chickens are the constantly improved – Stara Zagora red chicken and Black Shumen chicken. Important for people are not only the eggs, but also the meat of the chicken.

The rooster is the male chicken. It is bigger, with beautiful red comb and long beautiful feathers. It inseminates the hen and increase production of the eggs. It is famous with its voice. Its cock-a-doodle-doo can be heard early in the morning in the rural regions. The old Balkan breed is the Naked Neck chicken – without feathers on the neck, which is a good egg layer, and also bears the cold weather and bad conditions. When chickens are raised for broilers, their nourishing is fast and economical. A lot of the processes which the workers used to do today are fully mechanical.