Three Bucket Chicken Washing Method – Photo by Jen Pitino

Earlier this month, my sister and I dipped our toes into the pool of competitive chicken shows by entering several birds at our local county fair.  When I first started down the backyard chicken trail, I would have never considered getting into showing chickens.  So what changed?

New birds.

In fact, I have lots and lots of new chickens in my life which I have been remiss in telling you (the Urban Chicken Podcast family) all about. Late this past spring, I was generously gifted about 2 dozen rare and fancy breed day old chicks.  I have been sharing those birds with my sister and niece (a few living at my house and the bulk of birds at hers). Consequently we have decided to try our hands at chicken breeding and hatching with some of the recent additions to our flock.

We are now at a point where between our established flocks and all of the newbie birds, we have more chickens than we know what to do with – and they keep growing and eating more and more.  The hard truth is that we need to figure out which of our birds are of breeding quality and which are just pretty duds.

The timing of the local American Poultry Association (A.P.A.) sanctioned poultry show at our county fair was perfect!  We could take a bunch of the birds that we really needed some  professional feedback on and enter them into the chicken show.  The birds would be inspected and judged by an A.P.A. certified poultry expert, and he would be able to give us the insight that we needed to move forward.

Now entering chickens into a show involves more than just scooping your birds out of the backyard and dropping them off at the fairgrounds. There is an important primping process involved in getting your chickens ready to strut their stuff for the judges.  Today on the Urban Chicken Podcast, I walk you through how to get your birds ready to show – a process that I just experienced firsthand for the first time recently.

Like any beauty contest there are some tricks of the trade on getting gussied up for the judging.

Bathing Your Birds 

A Chicken Hug in the Bath (not staged) – photo by Jen Pitino

The most critical part of preparing you birds for show is giving them a good and proper bath.  Some sources will tell you to bathe the birds 5-7 days before show.  I don’t necessarily agree with that suggestion.  My sister and I washed our birds just two days before the show.  The thought behind the 2 days window was that there would be enough time for the birds to fully dry and preen but not so much time that they could get dirty again before being judged.

I’m not going to lie to you, chickens are super not particularly keen on bathing.  You will likely end up fairly wet and smelling of wet bird by the end of the bird bathing process. Don’t let a little chicken bath water deter you though – it’s a very doable process and not horrible. Though most chickens don’t like having a bath, if you have the water perfectly warm some chickens (once they accept that they’re all wet and stuck in a bath) seem to relax and

Cockerel Doesn’t Mind the Bath – Photo by Jen Pitino

enjoy the warmth of the water.  A couple of our birds acted like they were nodding off in the bath.  One word of caution, be sure that your water is not too hot, you don’t want to scald your chicken’s feathers or skin.

For our bathing process, my sister and I used the three bucket method out in her backyard. Some chicken sources on-line suggest that you wash your birds in your kitchen sink.  I can understand the argument for using one’s kitchen sink, certainly it is easier control the water temperature and rinse the bird than with the bucket system.  I however, do not personally subscribe to the kitchen sink method simply because the idea of washing dirty chickens where I prepare my food grosses me out.   Your chickens may look relatively clean, but I assure you that once you

Water Filthy after Washing 2 Pullets – photo by Jen Pitino

get them in a bath, you will be surprised by how filthy they actually are. If I were inclined to wash my chickens inside my house, the bath tub would seem a more tolerable location to do so.

Regardless of whether you choose the three bucket method in the yard or use a sink inside the house,  the process of properly washing your birds is the same. Under the three bucket method, each bucket represents a different step in the bathing process. If you are using your sink or tub you replicate each of the bucket bath stages.

The first bucket is soap bath step.  In this bucket you add a mild dish soap to the warm water. This stage of the bathing process is where you will actually remove all of dirt poop and other gunk from your bird’s feathers, feet, comb and wattles.  Gently work the soapy water into the bird’s feathers. Be gentle and only work the soap and soapy water stroking in the direction of the feathers – or you will break feathers otherwise. During the soapy bath, use an old toothbrush (now dedicated strictly to bathing birds) to scrub dirty legs and feet, beaks combs and wattles.  I should note that we did not scrub any of our birds’ earlobes.  I have read that wet ears can make birds much more susceptible to catching a chill and getting ill.  Is that true?  I really do not know, but decided to error on the side of caution.

It is also during the soapy bath stage that you scrub your bird’s legs. We entered several Jubilee Orpingtons, a variety of chickens with white legs, into the fair for judging.  It is worth noting that it required considerably more soaking and multiple scrubs with the toothbrush to get their white legs clean