The Chantecler was indeed a unique bird. From it's inception it was designed to fit into the Canadian climate and at the same time to have good production qualities. To avoid freezing the comb had to be small with proportionately small wattles. White plumage would cover a body abundant in meat and able to lay eggs in abundance during the cold Canadian winters. Characteristics of purely fancy character were to be avoided so that production qualities could be concentrated on. - Wayne Smith, from the Cheery Creek Canadians website

The future of the breed the will be on small hobby farms or family farms. The breed may be able to contribute added genetics to the commercial strains of today, but the answer to this question can not be known until a genetic analysis has been conducted. For its historical and heritage value the Chantecler should be supported and every effort should be made to recognize its contribution to the Canadian poultry scene The most important need is to obtain permission from the various Marketing Boards to maintain a genetically viable breeding unit of the breed. This unit would have to be monitored by the boards and a qualified geneticist to ensure that it's integrity was maintained as a truly pure breed. DNA analysis of this breed would be useful to assist in determining if it has any genes that could contribute to our knowledge of poultry genetics. - Canadian Farm Animal Genetic Resources Foundation

Chantecler chicken
Canadian Farm Animal Genetic Resources Foundation



The Chantecler chicken is a composite breed, derived from the following: Dark Cornish, White Leghorn, Rhode Island Red, White Wyandotte, Columbian Wyandotte and White Plymouth Rock. Brother Wilfrid was the poultryman in charge of the flocks at the Cistercian Trappist Monastery at Oka, Quebec, a small community located west of Montreal on the north shore of the Ottawa River. He realized that there were no birds of Canadian origin at Oka and decided to breed a truly Canadian fowl (Wilfrid, 1922). This task took 9 years to complete. Brother Wilfrid wrote a letter in 1941 explaining how he chose the name Chantecler. The name was taken from a hero in the French poet Rostand’s fable. popular in Paris about 1910, about the love between the rooster Chantecler and a golden pheasant hen. He thought that the name, derived from two French words, “chanter” – “to sing” and “clair” – “bright”, was ideal for his new breed. G.Toupin (1922) wrote the actual description of how the breed was developed, while still a student at Oka Agricultural Institute. He was a professor when the breed was eventually shown to the world.

In 1908, Brother Wilfrid was in charge of the poultry yards at Oka and when his father visited him they both realized that all the breeds at Oka were either European or from U.S.A. Brother Wilfrid decided that he had to do something about this situation and devoted many hours to planning how he could develop a breed that was unique to Canada. He decided that the breed should be dual purpose, white, and a good winter layer; above all, the comb and wattles should be relatively frost resistant. ...

Chantecler chickens
Cherry Creek Canadians Kamloops, British Columbia Canada Last updated July 7, 2009

Having helped to do our part with the conservation of the Canadian Horse, it was time to turn our attention to another little known, and rapidly disappearing Canadian developed breed – the Chantecler chicken. This breed remains quite rare, with only about a 1000 birds in existence, all being maintained only by small farms with an interest in the preservation of heritage breeds. Just as with the Canadian Horse, this rare poultry breed was also developed in Canada and thus is uniquely adapted to our climatic conditions. The original Chantecler, white in color, was created in the early 1900’s by a monk named Brother Wilfrid, who lived in Oka QC. This unique and very attractive dual purpose chicken breed, declared a “heritage” breed of QC by their parliament, is little known by the rest of Canada. The Chantecler chicken is noted as having critical status by the American Livestock Conservancy as well as by the Society for the Preservation of Poultry Antiquities, and endangered by Rare Breeds Canada. ...

Chantecler Chicken history

From the Cherry Creek Canadaians website: Three articles (reprinted with permission) by two authors on the development of the Chantecler breed. The breed is noted for being calm, gentle, and personable. A quiet dual-purpose bird with much breast and thigh meat. The chicks grow fast on a low food intake. The breed is very suitable for colder climates. They are very good layers, also in winter months, with an average egg production of 200 a year that weigh around 60 grams.

The Chantecler chicken: A clearly Canadian choice
JC Kenny East Ontario AgriNews Canada June 2000

... [Cathy] Teeple, known for both her sheep and rare poultry, had been interested in the birds for a while and recently came across a private breeder in Ashton. She says the white chickens are the only true Canadian breed, a piece of trivia garnered from Linda Gryner’s book, The Chantecler and Other Rare Breeds. Gryner, who also publishes a newspaper called The Feather Fancier out of Forest, in Southwestern Ontario, says it was a monk who established the breed in Quebec more than 80 years ago. "He wanted a breed that was multi-purpose - good for meat and eggs - that could also stand the cold Canadian climate," says Gryner. Gryner explains that the comb of chickens will often freeze in a cold environment. "This breed," she says, "has a very small comb and it’s very hardy." She says some of the original strain of Chanteclers still exists in the region of Quebec where they were developed. Gryner says that out of more than 100 different purebred types of poultry worldwide, the Chantecler is the only true Canadian breed. She adds that when farmers like Teeple decide to raise such birds it helps in the preservation of animals which otherwise might become extinct. ...