The Americana, Ameraucana, Araucana backyard chicken confusion

Trio of Ameraucana hens. Photo: Steven Walling

I don't know about you, but I'm stumped when my backyard-chicken-tending friends tell me they have Ameraucanas.

Thanks to Martha Stewart, everyone knows that Araucana chickens lay blue-shelled eggs; and again, thanks to Martha's commercial zeal, many living rooms are painted that blue color--giving new meaning to the term "eggshell finish".

With the word "Americana" on all our lips this Independence Day weekend, and the possibility of social gaffes looming when the party conversation turns, as it inevitably does, to poultry, here's the difference between Ameraucanas and Araucanas.

• The breeds evolved separately and both come in lots of colors, so you can't tell by the feathers.
• Ameraucanas have tails.
• Araucanas have ear tufts.
• Both breeds lay blue eggs, have pea combs and red earlobes.

You didn't know that chickens had earlobes until just now, did you?

Here's the tricky part. Ameraucanas are very rare:

• If the hen lays blue eggs and the owner says it's an Ameraucana, odds are that it's actually a mixed-breed hen in the catch-all category of Easter Egger. A real Ameraucana has slate-blue legs.

But don't bring that up, unless you want to ruin the Fourth of July party.

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Backyard Turkeys: The Next Wave in Gardening

Tom Terrific "displaying" for photographer Astrid Pryor

Meet Tom Terrific, the Narragansett turkey. He's a sociable guy, in fact you could call him a party animal. If he hears human laughter nearby he bowls over and gobbles happily, joining in.

Tom lives in a pretty garden in Grass Valley, California where he and his lady turkey hens stroll and peck. Tom likes to gobble to his neighbors while they're gardening, or talk through the fence to his Afghan Hound pals. If there's no one around he goes to his owner's side door, walks up the steps, and taps on the glass.

Tom strutted to his front fence to chat me up one afternoon. His friendly gobble and intelligent eyes were irresistible. I'd always heard that turkeys were dumber than a box of rocks, but Tom certainly wasn't.

Tom Terrific looks like he just came off a Thanksgiving Day place card. His ancestors and their cousins, the Bronzes, are the archetypal birds we see in illustrations every November.

Tom descends from a cross of English turkeys and the wild Eastern Turkeys in America. Narragansett turkeys boast black and white barred feathers (the striped effect) and sociable temperaments.

Temperament matters these days, as poultry has caught the American imagination and backyard chickens are all the rage. If you want to stay a four-toed, salmon-colored, clawed-foot ahead in the stylish living race, why not get a turkey now, before the rush starts in 2010?

The Narragansetts need your help, as they are losing the popularity contest to the Bronzes. The Society for the Preservation of Poultry Antiquities is concerned.

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Chicken Lady Hall of Fame: The Dowager Duchess of Devonshire

Chatsworth House

Chickens are about to overrun the gardens of America. Did you know that the suppliers of chicks have already sold out of many breeds?

We've all heard that every American has turned to vegetable gardening in a big way, and that none of us will be able to attend potlucks this summer unless we can bring our own homegrown tomatoes (this includes Manhattanites who garden on fire escapes). Now it appears that our farming genes have gone hog wild and we are in Old MacDonald mode--where a man's home is no longer his castle, but instead his fully-fledged farm complete with chickens.

My first hint that this trend was on the wing was when I read that Heather at Idaho Small Goat Garden was frantic for fowl, and just barely got her order for chicks filled. In gardening we often look to England for our advisers, and the lovely visage of the leading Chicken Lady of them all sprang instantly to my mind.

England's most famous chicken owner is the Dowager Duchess of Devonshire--also known as Deborah, Debo, or, most often, Her Grace.

As the chatelaine of Chatsworth, the ducal stately home in Derbyshire, she continued her own Mitford family tradition of keeping chickens.

The Dowager Duchess is the youngest of the flock of famous Mitford sisters. She grew up in Gloucestershire caring for Rhode Island Reds and White Leghorns, and at Chatsworth raised award-winning Dorkings, Derbyshire Redcaps, Welsummers, White Leghorns and Buff Cochins. Most of her chickens have the run of the park and are a curiosity for tourists. Talk about free range--we should be so lucky as to wander the gardens of Chatsworth without paying an entrance fee.

The Poultry Club of Great Britain praised the Dowager Duchess as "an excellent example of everything which is good about the Poultry Club." I'm not sure what that means, but it has a nice Edwardian ring to it. A true poultry fancier indoors as well as out, Her Grace is a collector of paintings and china depicting chickens. You think that puts her at the top of the pecking order of Chicken Ladies? There's more.

Gifted with business sense, and the Mitford literary skill, the Dowager Duchess wrote several books about life at Chatsworth, including a memoir, Counting My Chickens... The cover illustration of the first edition is a photo of Her Grace holding one of her chickens.

A prize to my first reader who correctly identifies the breed of chicken on the book cover. The winner will receive a prominent mention in my next Chicken Lady post--I would have awarded a live chick, but they're all sold out.