Jungle Fowl

Origin:  Asia

Category:  Hardfeather Light

Egg Colour:  White to Tinted

Sitter:  Yes

The Jungle Fowl is thought by many to be the probable ancestor of the domesticated chicken breeds of modern times. The Jungle Fowl, known as Gallus Gallus, can still be found in the jungles of Burmah, Northern India, the Philippine Islands, and several other countries.

The male very closely resembles the black-breasted red game in color of plumage. The female has a salmon-colored breast, striped neck feathers, and stippled body feathers almost identical with those of the modern brown Leghorn female. The Jungle Fowl differs from most other fowls in that it goes through an 'eclipse' moult. This is a transitional plumage that is reported to occur in summer during or after the breeding season. At this time the male feather colouring changes until he regains his full male plumage.

In voice both male and female resemble the common barnyard fowl. The crow of the wild male, however, is not so prolonged as in the case of his domesticated brother. In action they are quite similar to the modern Leghorn.

The wild jungle fowl usually lays two clutches of eggs a season, totalling from twenty-two to twenty-six eggs. In the modern domesticated variety this number is increased.

GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS

The form is bulky, broad across the back and shoulders, maintaining width through a medium length back and tapering from hips into tail.

The fowl stands high and very erect, with protruding breast and a tail at an angle of no higher than 40 degrees, being carried reasonably low. The tail is composed of fourteen feathers, shaped as in the barn-door cock, but not held so vertically. Tail feathers of a good width and nicely curved. The plumage is thick, and the feathers of the neck and upper tail-coverts are linear, pointed, and drooping.

Head and face bare, with a small circular patch of feathers over the ear-hole.

The comb is high and evenly serrated, rising from nostrils and clearing the back of the head.

There are two wattles under the base of the beak, and a smaller lobe under each ear. In the female both comb and wattles are rudimentary.

Legs stout, rather lengthened, with a single row of scales in front, and a double row behind, the sides of leg being reticulated.

Four straight toes, evenly scaled: a large spur on the inner side of the shank, about three-quarters of an inch above the back toe, attaining a length of one inch and a half in old birds.

The wings strong and curved; the quill-feathers suddenly narrowed from near their bases; the fifth and sixth primaries are the longest; the secondaries very little shorter. Wings carried well up, with tips protruding slightly past a tight rear.

Plumage is firm and compact with sickles and saddles long and abundant.

COLOUR

The Indian Jungle Fowl, Gallus Gallus, bears the closest resemblance to the well-known black red game of all the four wild forms of the Jungle Fowl. Every poultry fancier will at once recognize the fact that of all our domesticated varieties, the breed which most closely resembles the Jungle cock in colour, form, and carriage, is the Black-breasted Red Game. If the tail of a small Game cock of this variety were depressed so as to be carried much lower, it would be difficult to distinguish the bird, provided it had not been dubbed, from the descendants of its wild progenitors, and now roaming at large in the Indian jungle.

The breast and under parts of the young cock-birds are much broken up with rusty-coloured feathers, and in the first moult both sexes are similarly coloured mottled brown, with dusky wings and tail; when first hatched, the chicks are covered with cream-coloured down, and have sepia-coloured bands along centre of head and through the eyes.

THE COCK

In its breeding plumage the male Red Junglefowl is a striking bird, with white ear lobes, long orange and black mantle, orange and red rump feathers with a tuft of white at the base of the tail, blackish, sickle-shaped, inner tail feathers glossed with almost metallic green, and blackish-brown breast. The fowl can be described as follows:

Crown of head, nape, upper mantel and sides of neck deep bright orange-red;

Iris: red, or orange-red;

Comb: brick-red to scarlet-crimson;

Wattles: a rather more livid red;

Lobes: white;

Beak: dark horn;

Legs and feet: Slate-lead colour, equipped with long, often curved, very sharp spurs;

Neck and head feathers: bright orange, pale and golden where flowing over the back; larger hackles striped with black.

Back: rich deep winey, maroon-red colour highly glossed; lower back and upper tail-coverts, fiery orange, the latter golden-tipped; long hackles of the rump fiery orange, the centres of these hackles black but concealed by those overlying them;

Tail and its longest upper coverts, or sickle-feathers, black, brilliantly glossed with green; the gloss generally dominant on the coverts and all gloss absent or obsolete on the outermost tail-feathers;

Wing-coverts and shoulder of wing black glossed like the back; median wing-coverts like the lower back; greater coverts black; quills dark brown or blackish, the secondaries, chestnut on the outer web, and dusky within; the primaries dusky;

Under plumage blackish-brown faintly glossed with green.

THE HEN

The female has a salmon-coloured breast, striped neck feathers, and stippled body feathers almost identical with those of the modern brown Leghorn female.

Top of the head: reddish-brown, the feathers broadly edged with golden-yellow; feathers of nape orange-yellow with broad blackish centres, changing to pale golden-yellow on the longer hackles;

All the upper parts are full burnt-umber brown, the feathers vermiculated and centered sepia, with pale tawny shafts;

Wing-coverts and inner secondaries: reddish-buff or reddish-brown with pale shafts and dark brown vermiculations;

Primaries: dark brown edged with reddish brown; tail dark brown, mottled with dull reddish brown, absent on the outer pairs; breast dull Indian red with pale shaft-lines shading to dull cinnamon on the abdomen, much vermiculated with brown; under tail coverts black or blackish-brown;

Iris: orange to red; comb and small wattles, sometimes absent, dull crimson; beak horn;

The legs and feet are slate colour with no, or at best rudimentary spurs;

All under parts: winey reddish-brown, the shafts pale; primaries and their coverts, plain sepia, with the outer margins ashy.

SIZE AND WEIGHT

Wild Red Jungle Fowl males resemble well-conditioned fighting cocks in size and weight. Hume gives the length of the male as 25.0 (63cm) to 28.2 inches (72cm); the female as 16.5 (42cm) to 18.25 inches (46cm). Adult males will weigh from 1.5 (650g) to 2.0 pounds (90g); females are slightly smaller. As with the ring-necked pheasants, after several generations in captivity, these birds tend to become heavier. In exhibition half a pound heavier is the norm and the weights below are considered standard. Note that these are shown as 'standard' not bantam fowl.

Cock weight: 2 - 2 1/2 lb. 900 to 1100 grams. Hen weight: 1 1/4 - 1 1/2 lb. 550 to 660 grams.

DEFECTS

In addition to those mention on the Disqualifications page:

• Oversized facial features, eg. wattles, comb etc

• Abnormally high carriage of tail

• Absence of back length

• Any abnormality

SOURCES

• Poultry production by Lippincott, William Adams, 1882-1931. Publication date 1921. Publisher Philadelphia and New York, Lea & Febiger. https://ia600206.us.archive.org/20/items/poultryproductio00lipp/poultryproductio00lipp.pdf

• Note on the Red Jungle Fowl, with description of a new race. Publication date 1928 https://archive.org/details/biostor-106371

• Red junglefowl and Kalij pheasants / by Gardiner Bump and Wayne H. Bohl. Main Author: Bump, Gardiner. Related Names: Bohl, Wayne H. Language(s): English Published: Washington, D.C. : U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, [1961] https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/006867598

• STUDY OF PLUMAGE OF THE FOUR SPECIES OF THE GENUS GALLUS G. VICTOR MOREJOHN, Department of Biological Science, San Jose State College San Jose, California 95114 https://sora.unm.edu/sites/default/files/journals/condor/v070n01/p0056-p0065.pdf

• The poultry book: comprising the breeding and management of profitable and ornamental poultry, their qualities and characteristics; to which is added "The standard of excellence in exhibition birds," authorized by the Poultry club. By W.B. Tegetmeier. With coloured illustrations by Harrison Weir. Published: London, G. Routledge and sons, 1867. https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/011617672

• Australian Poultry Standards Edition 2, Published 2012 by Victorian Poultry Fanciers Association Limited.