As a father to two young boys, ages 5 and 8, I spend a lot of time going up and down department store toy aisles, just to window shop. Lately, I’ve noticed something strange: A lot of the board games are poultry-related. People must be realizing how much fun chickens are. Because my family loves to play games, we decided to get a couple of these chicken games (and one about ducks) and try them out. Here are our six favorites.
Count Your Chickens
Players work together to help the mother hen collect her chicks and bring them back to the coop. Spin and move, count the number of spaces, and collect that number of chicks. This is a cooperative chicken game, so everyone wins, which is brilliant, especially when you have a toddler in the house.
Ages: 3-5
Players: 2-4
Find out more: Mindware
Chickyboom
Wow, my 7-year-old and I had a lot of fun with this balancing game! One person balances all the weighted pieces—chickens, wagon wheels and hay bales, with different point values—and players gently remove pieces trying not to topple the stack. It teaches a lot about balance, manual dexterity and arithmetic. This award-winning, all-wooden chicken game is also sustainably made.
Ages: 4 and up
Players: 2-4
Find out more: Blue Orange Games
Lucky Ducks
This is an adorable game for younger kids. My 4-year-old loved it. It’s a simple matching game, where ducks go round and round a motorized, circular pond and players pick them up trying to match the shapes on the ducks’ bottoms.
Ages: 3 and up
Players: 2-4
Find out more: Pressman Toys
Chicks Go Boom!
Players roll the die to see which chicks can be tossed into the coop, but they have to move quickly before the coop pops up and the chicks all fly off. It’s similar to the classic Perfection game but with chickens. This chicken game was fun and exciting to play.
Ages: 4 and up
Players: 2-4
Find out more: PlayMonster
Catch the Fox
The game is simple: Roll the die to see how many chickens to add into the fox’s pockets, and tap his head one time. On a random turn, the fox loses his pants and the chickens roll everywhere, and players pick them up and return them to their chicken coops. First to fill up their coop wins. Both my boys (oh, OK—me, too) found this hilarious. It’s still fun to play after a few months.
Ages: 4 and up
Players: 2-4
Find out more: Goliath Games
Flickin’ Chicken
This game is described as “rubber chicken meets disc golf.” Each player chooses a different color of rubber chicken and tosses it at the far-away target in turn. The winner is the one who hits the target within the least amount of throws as possible over nine rounds. This one is great for older kids.
Ages: 6 and up
Players: 2-4
Find out more: Haywire Group
This story originally appeared in the November/December 2018 issue of Chickens magazine.
