Storey's Illustrated Guide to Poultry Breeds: Chickens, Ducks, Geese, Turkeys, Emus, Guinea Fowl, Ostriches, Partridges, Peafowl, Pheasants, Quails, Swans

It's about time that a nice & complete book like this on 99.9% of poultry breeds (that even I can afford!) has came out. As an avid chicken lady I used to long for a complete guide with color photos on Chicken and Duck breeds. Finally, Carol Ekarius has gave the "poultry addicted" a book dedicated to the characteristics of each poultry breed. This book has really nice real photos (not drawings!) of all the included breeds. Also included by the photo's are details of the breeds' personality, the various color combinations, standards of the breed, place and history of orgin, conservation status and any special qualities that the featured breed might have. In most cases the males AND females of each breed are pictured. Other pluses the author includes are: Natural Chicken history, a wonderful glossary of 'poultry jargon', color photos of the various feather patterns- along with a worded definitions. Last but, not least Ms. Ekarius included a very well researched Resource index. If you buy this book (which I suggest) you will find 278 pages printed on nice glossy, flexible paper stock. This isn't the usual small black & white Storey's guide book! The only reason I didn't give this book 5 stars is because quite a few photos of the chicken breeds were only represented by the bantam versions of the breed. I just feel that being the history of the breeds was being represented the standard size chickens should've been used. Nevertheless, I really enjoyed this book and I would recommend it to anyone! Carol Ekarius besides being a wonderful writer is also donating a portion of her proceeds from this book to the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy!

I love these's books. Alot of good information, great pictures. Written so you can understand them!

What a bargain this big, beautiful book is is! Nice photos and one or two page descriptions of just about all the common US standard bred chickens, plus ducks and geese. Great for the person considering a new breed. This book can help you determine which breeds are: -gentle/docile versus aggressive -calm or "flighty" -quiet or noisy -cold-hardy or cold-intolerant -good layers or poor layers -brown, white, or tinted egg layers -largest and smallest -easy keepers or in need of special husbandry -plain or fancy-looking! I've spent hours reading and re-reading this book. :) If you are new to chickens (or ducks or geese) this is a handy and beautiful book which can help you avoid making a mistake that could sour you on chickens. Don't end up with an aggressive flighty bird if you are looking for a cuddly family pet-- check out this book and another great one (which has slightly different kinds of information) entitled "Choosing and Keeping Chickens".

My nephew raises chickens and ducks and he absolutely loved this book!

I wanted this book because I thought, as a first time chicken owner, it would help me to learn more about chickens. I believe this book may be helpful for those wanting to show their chickens or maybe breeders. I wanted to know more on Black Copper Marans but this book only mentions Marans in general. It does have some beautiful photos.

The title says it all. I wanted a book of chicken breeds, so I could see how the hens of various breeds looked. Unfortunately, the books I bought before this had awesome photos of roosters or just the heads of roosters or roosters with blurry hens in the background. This book does a good job of giving some information about the breeds and having pictures of both hens and roosters. It has a good selection of chicken breeds although I wish it had a few more. I also enjoyed looking at the other poultry breeds in the book. While I don't feel the need to go buy a turkey, duck, or emu I was glad to be able to read about them. This book was a great addition to my library and I highly recommend it.

This is my new number color photo reference poultry book of all time! I am only investing in books I know I can count on. Also books that I can keep at hand in hard copy as a reference library. If your new to poultry or chickens not sure what type or breed this a good place to start.

We have been doing poultry for about 15 years. We originally got this book for our daughter when she was about 6 because of the colored pictures, but we quickly learned that this book was so much more. It's a fantastic book to teach you all about your breed and the pictures help so you know what your bird is suppose to look like. We give this book to our grand champion every year at county fair. The kids and their parents love getting it!!

Beautiful coloured pictures

What a great book. I bought it for the photo references for drawing and painting, but the information about the history and peculiarities of each breed is fascinating. I love that they feature ducks, turkeys, quail, geese, partridges, swans etc. so it makes for a comprehensive overview.

Ótimo livro! Recomendo. Possui bastante fotos que ilustram bem o padrão das raças, assim como informações a respeito delas. Poderia haver mais informações e fotos de aves que não fossem galináceos, mas não deixa de ser ótimo.

brilliant book for the beginner chicken owner - my son in law to be sat for hours looking at the different breeds and is now trying to decide which breed he wants in his new garden.

I liked this book full of information but lacking in info on types of eggs that birds lay size colour etc, good pics but not nearly enough chicken breeds covered hopefully they will address this and just do a book about chickens and concentrate on all the relevant info