🐔 Chicken Name Generator

Naming a backyard flock

Pecking order is a chicken word

The phrase pecking order comes from chickens. The Norwegian zoologist Thorleif Schjelderup-Ebbe studied hens in the early 1920s and described how a flock sorts itself into a stable hierarchy, in which each bird knows which hens may peck it and which it may peck. Every backyard flock does the same, usually within days of meeting. It is worth waiting to see the order before naming, because the hen who ends up at the top has earned a grand name like Queen or Duchess, and it rarely goes to the bird you expected.

Hen, pullet, cockerel, rooster

Chickens change names as they grow. A female under about a year old is a pullet, and becomes a hen once she is older; a young male is a cockerel, and an adult male is a rooster, or a cock in British English. Sexing young chicks is not perfectly accurate, even when they are sold as pullets, so many keepers have a Henrietta who turns out to crow. Neutral names such as Nugget, Peep or Sunny save a renaming. Many towns allow backyard hens but not roosters, so a surprise cockerel may also need a new home.

Let the breed suggest the name

Breeds look very different, and a name that fits the look helps visitors tell the flock apart. The Buff Orpington, bred in Orpington in Kent in the 1880s, is a big, soft golden bird that suits Butterbean or Goldie. The Silkie has fur-like feathers and black skin, and suits Cotton or Marshmallow. The Barred Plymouth Rock is striped black and white, and the Rhode Island Red is a deep mahogany. Speckled Sussex hens have white-tipped feathers. Naming to markings works better with chickens than with most pets, because adult feathering is stable.

Names make the record-keeping work

Keepers who track eggs, moults and health quickly find that names do real work. A note that Pearl has stopped laying, or that Dottie is pecking the others, is useless if nobody remembers which hen is which. Many keepers fit coloured leg rings and pair each ring colour with a name, so a quick look at the run tells you who is who. A flock list with each name, breed and hatch date also helps at the vet, and later in life, when an older hen's age decides how her care should change.