Chicks and Chickens

As always, the author has done an admirable job of describing chickens: breeds, life cycle,origins, anatomy, behavior, egg structure, hatching and egg production. While she does depictlarge farms in an accurate way, the majority of the illustrations depict small free-range birds and behavior. She does not promote one structure over the other, however. The illustrations are a 4 mixed bag. Some are very accurate, others poor. The first page of the book is an example of poor illustrations. The hen looks like her back is hunched and the head of the chicken in the forefront looks like it are in pain. Also illustrations of people are poor. The strengths of the book outweigh these weaknesses, but they should be addressed as the book is used.