.

Phoenix are descendants of the chickens that are seen in Japanese illustrations, which bear tails of 15 to 20 feet or longer. The only breed today that gets a tail of this length is the Onagadori. After the second year, the roosters no longer molt their sickle feathers. To maintain these tails, the birds are kept up on high roosts the way parrots are. Most of the Longtails do partially molt their sickle feathers each year, although individual feathers may be shed only every second or third year. This gene can be selected for, and a careful and longterm breeding project can produce birds with nonshedding tail feathers. Our original bloodlines came out of Texas.