Thirty-three years ago my wife and I were privileged to stumble across a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to restore a breed of chickens that had ceased to exist in the first half of last century. Now, we are both retiring we are desperate to find others to help keep this beautiful, dual purpose breed preserved. Here is how it all began...
In 1929 Lord Greenway first saw the Marans at the Paris exhibition and was attracted by the fine texture of their meat and their gourmet flavour. He brought eggs back to the UK and developed the Dark Cuckoo and Silver Marans with the help of his Poultry Manager, J S Parkin
He first showed Marans at Crystal Palace in 1934 and they were subsequently shown at the World Poultry Congress in Rome and London. The Dark Cuckoo and Silver Marans were accepted into the British Poultry Standard in 1935. The Dark Cuckoo Marans were bred much more than the Silver Marans and by the 1950s the Silver Marans had totally disappeared, that is until 1978.
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Photo caption: Silver Marans hens with rooster
read the rest of this article and more, including DIY tips, in the December 2011 issue of Featherd World
