Chicken Coop Chatter©
SWEDISH FLOWER HENS: Until recently, very few people in the world (including most Swedes) have ever had the opportunity to see living examples of this breed, let alone the ability to own and raise them. Greenfire farms was the first to locate and import a small flock of this breed into the US. Swedish flower hens emerged as a landrace several hundred years ago, the product of a now forgotten mix of primitive breeds that were brought to Sweden by settlers and conquerors. As a landrace, this breed was not intentionally created by a breeder carefully selecting birds as part of a structured breeding program. Rather, this breed was created through natural selection and random pairings as the breed adapted to the climate and conditions of the Sydskanska Plain in southern Sweden.
Swedish flower hens are the largest breed of chickens native to Sweden. Roosters can weigh as much as 8 pounds. With the commercialization of Sweden's poultry flocks in the last half of the 20th Century, this breed almost became extinct. A couple of decades ago, remnant flocks were identified in three small, rural Swedish villages and a focused effort was made to save the breed. By the late 1980s fewer than 500 birds existed in the world.
Today, about a thousand Swedish flower hens live in about fifty scattered flocks, and until Greenfire Farms began working with this breed, few if any could be found outside remote villages in Sweden. Swedish flower hens are called blommenhons in Swedish; literally 'bloom hens'. The complex and brilliant color and feather patterns of the birds do indeed evoke the image of a tangle of wildflowers. Against fallen snow, they are outstanding in colorations. Their full visual appeal cannot be adequately appreciated unless you witness firsthand the rich and striking colors of the birds. Our photographs of them are quite good, but they are even more brilliant in person. Perhaps even more impressive is the personality and hardiness of this breed. The personality, poise and confidence of this breed around people makes them endearing and enjoyable and the roosters are never aggressive around their caretakers. They are independent, making them excellent free-range birds, but they seem to enjoy interaction with humans. This breed is relatively calm, but always alert and attentive. They seem to have all the positive aspects of chicken personalities without the negatives of some well know breeds. This breed is unusually hardy, rarely displaying signs of illness or lethargy. They display vigor and adaptation to their environment that some other breeds do not display. Our Flower hens are crested and non-crested and you may receive some of each variety in the light brown, large to extra large size fertile eggs.
In June 2015, we acquired hatching eggs for another genetic line of Swedish Flower hen. These are all non-crested and no split wing, so they have the potential for carrying the genetics for either crested or non.
Again in June of 2017 we acquired a new line of offspring for *snoleopard*, which is a color pattern, much lighter than most of the other lines we have previously raised. Thank you to Lisa N. for the opportunity to add this line to our flocks.
Our Swedish Flower Hen roosters won in a 2014 Photo Calendar contest. We have customers that have shown our Swedish offspring and won Blue ribbons and our birds have been used as therapy chickens because of their intelligence and ease of handling.
PLEASE NOTE: CHICKS AND HATCHING EGGS ARE CURRENTLY NOT AVAILABLE. THEY WILL NOT BE AVAILABLE UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE. IN THE MEANTIME, PLEASE FEEL FREE TO PERUSE THE INFORMATION ABOUT BREEDS, RECIPES AND CHICKEN CARE ON THE WEBSITE. OUR FB PAGE IS STILL AVAILABLE FOR QUESTIONS THAT WE ARE ALWAYS HAPPY TO ANSWER. THANK YOU FOR YOUR PATIENCE AS WE REPLENISH OUR FLOCKS FOR THE FUTURE. 4-20-2021
$45.00 per dozen fertile hatching eggs.+ $17.90 Shipping
We do pro-rate for less than one dozen, for those with small incubators. Email us at: [email protected]. Please put breed name in the subject line and quantity in the body of the email. You will need a current Paypal account (easy and quick to set up). Please add us to your address book so our mail does not go to your spam folder. Thank You for your interest in JFA fertile hatching eggs.
Note: Our genetic lines have been obtained from: Stag Creek, Hambrick Farms, Greenfire Farms, Musselman, and Dennis Zastoupil (Snoleopard line)
Chicken Coop Chatter© and Just Fowling Around© All Rights Reserved 2011-2021
Debra R~~WA state
*Just picked up the girls from the fair and just to let you know Lucky won the superintendent award the green ribbon she is one of the eggs that I got from you that hatched after 23 days she did not hatch so tried to crack it and there was a chirp so quickly stuck her back under mother hen and there she was bright eyed and bushy tailed and today she is the superintendent's choice she is a dark one with the big top knot!!!!! *Debra also took blue ribbons for both the SFH she entered from JFA.
Nicole D. WA state
We got 2 Swedish Flower Hens last summer, they grew into beautiful friendly and amazing birds. We have since hatched some of the prettiest chicks from these girls. Such high quality birds that we love everyday!
Mandee C. ID.
The Swedish Flowers are doing great. It sure was nice meeting you and we cant wait to see how they turn out.