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The Sapphire Gem Chicken: The Complete Info Guide

sapphire-gem-chicken

Also known as the Sapphire Blue Plymouth Rock or Blue Plymouth Rock, the Sapphire Gem is all the rage for novelty and specialty chicken fanciers.

Scouring the internet for information on this rare variety will most likely lead you down a dead-end road or to the local jewelers’ websites.

There is conflicting information on this variety of chicken, but everyone seems to agree that this bird is a new favorite.

The Sapphire Gem is not an actual breed of chicken and is not recognized by the APA.

Most hatcheries that sell this little gem are vague in their descriptions, and that’s probably because it’s a new variety of chicken.

In fact, you can only purchase this chick from a handful of hatcheries, and it even appears as though one hatchery has the name Sapphire Gem trademarked

We know about this mysterious chicken because the Sapphire Gem is a cross between heritage and hybrid chickens and was developed in the Czech Republic.

This treasured bird is said to be crossed with a Blue Plymouth rock and a Barred Plymouth Rock.

Since the popularity and excitement over the Easter Egger have begun to dwindle, many chicken lovers are rejoicing at adding another fun chicken to add some spice to their flock.

Image Source: https://imgur.com/user/Goldenchicks

Sex-linked of The Sapphire Gem

The Sapphire Gem is a sex-linked chicken variety of chick, which means that their gender can be determined shortly after they hatch by observing their feathers’ colors.

Cross-breeding chickens cause this trait.

Another important note about the bedazzling beauties is that they do not breed true. If you are new to chicken lingo, this means that if you breed two Sapphire Gems, you will not necessarily get another Sapphire Gem. 

Sapphire Gem

The appearance of the Sapphire Gems

If you love exotic colors in your flock, the Sapphire Gem will catch your eye with its lavender and blue feathering. 

The roosters are typically blue with a white dot on their head, while the hens are mostly blue with a necklace-like ring of gold or grey adorning her neck.

Some go gaga for these colors, and some seem to turn up their noses. So, it’s safe to say that reviews on appearance seem to be mixed.

The Sapphire Gem has an upright appearance, similar to that of a Plymouth Rock, due to its genetics, and she sports a single comb atop her alert little head. 

Size of the Sapphire Gems

The Sapphire Gem is a medium-sized chicken. She won’t tower over your Easter Eggers nor cower under the Brahma.

They are a middle-of-the flock size and can hold their own amongst a mixed flock of chickens. 

Sapphire Gems Eggs

Large, brown eggs are the Sapphire Gem’s specialty, and it’s a common misconception that this chicken lays blue eggs because she is often confused with the Sapphire chicken (a small white bird that lays bright blue eggs). 

This little engine can produce year-round and has been said to lay up to a whopping 290 eggs per year! So, as you can see, her purpose is a production and is not typically used as a meat chicken. 

Sapphire Gem Chicken

Cold Hardiness of the Sapphire Gems

The Sapphire Gem chicken does well in all climates, with reports of withstanding cold winters with grace and without decreased production.

As with other single-combed breeds, protecting the Sapphire Gem from frostbite during the colder months is wise to prevent their combs from falling off near the end of the season. 

Sapphire Gems are Free-Rangers

Sapphire Gems are wonderful free-range candidates if you like to let your chickens run free.

They are excellent foragers and have no trouble finding the tastiest morsels in the yard.

While they are a calm variety of chickens, they are also alert and aware of predators, making them even better off if they have the yard run. 

The Temperament of the Sapphire Gems

Raving fans will happily tell anyone who will listen how incredibly calm and docile this chicken is. Photos are circulating of the Sapphire Gems calmly sleeping in the arms and hands of their adoring owners.

They are said to love to cuddle and are one of the sweetest chicken varieties for the kids.

While this chicken is the new “It Girl” on the scene, little is known about the origins and where to obtain her.

You can bet that the popularity she has already gained will only continue to grow, maybe even as fast as that of the Easter Egger!

READ NEXT: Easter Egger: Everything You Need To Know About This Chicken

Sapphire Gem Chicken

68 thoughts on “The Sapphire Gem Chicken: The Complete Info Guide

    1. I have gone to this hatchery and they are very good. It was a great alternative side the last group of chicks I had delivered via the mail 5/6 were DOA.

  1. Do chickens quit laying when it gets so hot outside ? I haven’t gotten any eggs the last 3 days and it finally got in the 100s just this week.Or could there be something else ?

  2. I have a mixed flock of brown egg layers and the sapphire gem hens lay extra small eggs , pretty to look at but poor quality eggs

    1. Really!? I just got two Sapphire Gems this spring and they were the first to start laying. The first layer was only 4.5 months old when she started and from the beginning (besides two fairy eggs) she’s layed large eggs. The second one started laying at 5 months and she is also lying large eggs even though she’s only been laying for about 2-3 weeks. I was honestly surprised with how big the eggs were in such a short amount of time. I’ve been very pleased with these birds so far.
      That’s such a shame that you haven’t had the same experience with them.

      1. I have one sapphire gem. She is an excellent layer, good natured, and very social bird. In our flock she is a star! Her eggs are large brown eggs second to none. ?????

      2. Yeah I have a 9 month old Sapphire Gem and she lays HUGE eggs, they barely fit in the egg carton! Are you sure you don’t have the wrong breed, sometimes hatcheries lie…

    2. When your Saphire Gem Chickens first start laying eggs they will be smaller but then they will get bigger as they continue to lay eggs

  3. My sapphire gem is the best bird in our mixed flock (buff orpington, 3 easter eggers), and she’s been laying everyday since 5 months old (big eggs and double yolks ). Anyway she’s a fun smart bird that doesn’t need supervision outside. I know all chickens are different, maybe we just got lucky, but she acts like a pet. I’d recommend the breed to anyone starting out .

    1. I have three sapphire gems, they all started laying early, all eggs are jumbo size, with a significant amount of double yolks. Extremely gentle and comes when called. Love these girls!

  4. I have 10 I hand raised thinking the would be sweet like everyone reported. Nope mine keep their distance don’t want to be around any human once grown. except when I have food but even then keep their distance

    1. My sapphire gem isn’t mean, she just keeps her distance and is kind of haughty. But when I pick her up she doesn’t squirm out or anything. I do have the SWEETEST Americauna she ‘s small and lays tiny blue eggs but she comes right up to me and when I pick her up she lays her little head on my arm and closes her eyes. SOOO CUTE! I would definitely recommend getting Americaunas!

      1. I have six of them and I also use all of my birds to work the huge mulch bed.
        All my other breeds are off and on in the mulch but the SGs are always at work turning out good mulch fo my gardens.
        They also lay big double yokes.

  5. It’s my first year of raising chickens and I got an assortment of 10 different breeds. “Silvie” my sapphire gem is my favorite in the flock. She always approaches me, had beautiful brown eyes, and if I figured out which egg is hers right, then she’s laying large light brown eggs well starting around 22 weeks. She is my largest hen, and probably a little overweight.

  6. Why is Catch a tori farm breeding Sapphire Gem to Sapphire Gem? They are not breeding the Breeders that create the sapphire Gem.

        1. So did I! I picked three pullets of varying shades. Turns out 2 of my pullets are roos. :-/ Got them on March 15. The Roos are trying to crow and to ‘cover’. The sideways head tilt with the glowering stare from Stormy when Rainman jumped on him, priceless. Rainman got his name because he would stay out under the shrubs or foraging in the rain. So annoying when there’s lightning.

  7. i ha two sapphire gems, one is like my little baby, the other not as close but getting there. beautiful girls

  8. Love them! I have two 1 is super friendly (Stormy)she’s been trying to gain higher ground since she was tiny so now enverytime I bend/kneel/squat down she hops right onto my back making her way up to my shoulder as I stand up I believe the leader amongst the 9 others. They’re both very intelligent that’s for sure, Breezy the shyer of the 2 gave me my very first egg ON MY BIRTHDAY! The very nyday Stormy started and they’ve been laying extra large cream/light tan colored eggs since. They consistently lay, Breezey had given me a number of double yolkers that looked like emu eggs!
    Amazing breed ! Just hope not too amazing to be true only time will tell with this new exciting beautiful breed ?

  9. I purchased 4 Sapphire Gems from a friend laying size. One consistantly lays large light brown eggs, some double yokers. The other 3 don’t lay every day. May only get 1 or 2 eggs a day. They get plenty of layer feed and corn a day and free range a short time due to predators. Don’t understand why three of them don’t lay much. I live in S. FL, so their not exposed to cold much. Any ideas? Am incubating some of their eggs. Don’t know what to expect, but hoping for some large eggs.

    1. The sapphire gems were bred by a white crossbred golden comet rooster and I wanted some babies that would grow to lay more large brown eggs. Waiting to see what or how many will hatch. The hens are beautiful, docile, and friendly.

  10. I recently hought 9 baby chicks that are sapphire gems.. this morning 1 had passed and another is very weak and on her way 🙁
    I have them in the house right now with large cedar chips and heat lamp.. also.giving them fresh water and water with probiotics and electrolytes added… originally the water was well water as we are out in the country so I have switched it to bottled hoping that was my problem. Was giving them chick grit and going to look for something different today as well in case it is the food.. the other 7 seem to be doing well so maybe its just you lose some… any suggestions?

    1. I’m not sure about the use of cedar chips, only pine. But change bedding every other day. And they can get Coccillia. Not spelled correctly, sorry. But my grand mother always said to add a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar to one quart of water. 4 tablespoons per gallon. Good luck.

    2. The cedar chips may be the problem . The aroma of the chips are causing lung issues for their tiny lungs . Cedar is good for adults dogs , to help control flees and mites , but can cause severe issues with smaller animals. Also have a area of sand or dry loose dirt for the chickens to take a dust bath . They love doing this , and it helps control mites as well .

    3. Replying several months later, so too late to be of help. Noticed you said Chick Grit, but that is not feed, & is for chicks older than 2 weeks. Grit is given to aid in digestion when chickens can’t free-range & get it themselves from dirt. Also, we’re on well water, & my chicks are all fine. I use Hydro Hen every other day in it. My SG’s are so sweet & curious!

    4. Chick grit is not food. It is tiny little pieces of gravel that help them digest their food. There is no nutrition in it. On my bag, it said to make sure that they are not eating too much when you first introduce it at two weeks along with their actual feed. If you are just giving them grit, then you are just feeding them rocks.
      And both of my rabbits died shortly after introducing cedar bedding to their cages.

    5. Cedar chips are fine and is commonly sold in the chicken isle of farm stores. The trick is to have a well vented area/coop. It keeps flies away more than pine. I also have well water. My 6 sapphires are doing very well. They forage during the day and get regular feed at night. They dont like the grit as they think it is bath material. I also give squash and green apples as a treat which they love. Sometimes you will have sickly chicks that dont recover.

    6. I think the cedar chips may be the problem. Use something else for bedding. I have one plus 3 easter eggers and the sapphire gem is bigger than all the others and smart and calm. They are on flake at night and since they have feathers they are on grass (in a movable pen) during the day. Also the red mulch for flowers is very toxic to hens (and other animals if they eat it). These are birds 2 months old now. I have about 60 chickens.

  11. Any recommendations where I can find Sapphire Gem chickens for purchase close to Colorado?

    1. We got ours from A farm store, they get their chickens from Hoover’s hatchery in Rudd, IA

    2. We ordered from tractor supply. They’re supposed to ship wherever and come from Hoovers Harchery in Iowa.

    3. I purchased some in March through Tractor Supply online. I never thought I would love a chicken, but I love these, lol.

  12. What are your thoughts on the sapphire Gem rooster? I realized I have one and it was sexed wrong… it is already starting to crow but I was curious if it will REALLY crow or sound like the one on your video 🙂

  13. I have sapphire gems, white leghorns, ISA browns, and golden comets. I know that several of those breeds will not breed true. I would like to hatch some eggs for future hens. Do you have a suggestion for a good rooster breed to mate with them?

  14. I have a Sapphire Gem that I got just by chance. She is my favorite! She loves sitting on my lap and is super smart and social. We get one very large egg from her every single day without fail. She’s a good girl. Wish I had a dozen more like her.

  15. I have 10 Sapphire Gems that are 8 weeks old. I love them they are beautiful and friendly. My grand daughters love playing with them

  16. I have 6 SG (one week old) and have ordered 5 more day old chicks that will be in Friday. Can I go ahead and mix them together since they are so young or will I have to separate them until they get use to each other?

    1. Hi Judi, I know it’s been a while since you posted this, but I’d like to know how your SG chicks did? I’m getting ready to order some in a couple of weeks from Hoover’s Hatchery. I’d love any tips you could give me!

  17. Go online and check with Hoover Hatchery. I just purchased and had shipped 15 chicks from them two weeks ago. Three of the 15 are Sapphire Gems.

  18. I bought 10 hens from Tractor Supply (Hoover Hatchery) in April. Now at three months old they’re all hens and healthy. Very friendly. Several hop on my shoulders. Several like to have their backs rubbed in the mornings. They don’t try to run away when we let them out of their run. My grandkids love to cuddle with them and feed them meal worms.

  19. hi, I got 9 sapphire gems. They are now 4 months old. I have little combs and big combs, they already laying but I can’t figure out which ones because they like to lay at 6am. Those who have sapphire gems hens how big are their combs?

  20. My sapphire gems are quirky. One likes to go off alone to sleep. She’s the last one in the coop and often we find her in the milking barn alone in the dark because she doesn’t want to go inside the coop at all. They lay huge cream colored eggs. They never had pullet sized eggs. Shockingly big eggs – many double yolked! Lol ?

  21. I have had our sapphire gem for over a year. She was first to produce eggs. She was first to do anything. (They are very smart) Her eggs are giant!!!! She always seemed to be separate from the flock. A couple of months after Our sweet dominant hen passed away, she started to peck me she learned that was not allowed then I introduced four 6 week old babies. she started to try to kill the babies. I took her to live with an older flock of chicks that were bigger than her but only 5 months old. She would chase them but not hurt them. I brought her back home after two days of this and have kept her away from the babies. Generally, this chicken has been sweet until now. She is smart so I am trying to teach her to be sweet. The other two adult hens are also standing up to her and telling her to be nice. I’ve only had chickens for a year so this is all new to me. I spend at least a half an hour a day with them and I try to teach them I’m the head of the pecking order. That way, as the flock changes there will be stability in the pecking order. This may be foolish but the only other option is to eliminate the sapphire Gem.

  22. Does anyone know what kind of winters this chicken can sustain? The article says they’re cold hardy, but doesn’t give any temperature or weather examples. I want to make sure I get a heating element ahead of time if I need one.

  23. I have two Sapphire Gems, along with White Leghorns and Easter Eggers. I love them all..My Saph Gems consistently give me eggs daily…I am excited to know they may lay through the winter! The funny thing is, I named them Stevie and Ding Dong. Ding Dong is always, ALWAYS, the last one to come back into the pen at night…..she always finds a way to dawdle her way back for the night….

  24. I am guessing that since they have Plymouth Rock (a cold-hardy breed) in their bloodline and were developed in the Czech Republic (Central Europe has miserable winters, take it from a guy who knows!) that they’d do fine in most areas of the country. I am in the market for new chicks and am seriously thinking of trying some this spring. Our local Tractor Supply had them this past spring (but I didn’t finish my brooder house until late this summer).

  25. So I just got my first chickens. Well baby chicks, 2 Golden comets and 2 Sapphire gems. I got them at Tractor Supply in Gastonia, NC. I read the article here about the Sapphire gems being rare. Nobody at Tractor Supply said anything about them being special or rare. I thought maybe they weren’t Sapphire gems and Tractor Supply just got the name wrong but I looked them up and they look just like all the pics of Sapphire gems that I found. They had a whole brooder full of them. Did I get lucky? Any input would be appreciated.

  26. I ordered 10 Sapphire Gems from Jenks Hatchery and they will be two weeks old this Saturday (May 1st). The experience was disappointing…not because of the hatchery (they were great and I’d recommend them!) but because of the postal service. The chicks had a long, terrible trip. One was DOA and 4 others were very weak and died within 24 hours. And all were somewhat weak; I had a hard time getting them to drink and eat. However, the remaining 6 (they sent an extra) are doing fine, growing, and are really cute. I guess they are the tough ones. I’ve seen adult birds of this breed and therefore know what I have to look forward to! Unfortunately the postal service has gotten really poor when it comes to shipping chicks. The nice folks at Jenks said I wasn’t the only one who had such trouble, they refunded the money for the dead one and the ones that died. Our local feed store, which sells chicks, told me they had an order of 50 ducklings out of which only 15 arrived alive. From now on I may just get chicks from the feed store. There you can at least see what you are getting. I’ve been raising poultry all my life and have ordered chicks from several hatcheries, all of which were good. I don’t know what’s gotten wrong with the postal service but it is evidently a real problem. Our tax dollars at work!

  27. We just got seven sapphire gems from the local tractor supply and I’ve read in your blog that you can tell the sex of the chicks Days after they’re born but it does not say how you can towel? It sounds like the males grow up and are blue with a white dot on their head and the females have a yellow or gray ring around their neck but is this the same for the chicks? Three of mine are light gray and the rest are darker. Most of them have a yellow or white streak or dot on their head.

  28. I have a few sapphire gem chickens with 1 sapphire gem rooster, he turned a year old in march and he still doesn’t crow. does this mean he’s not fertile? I would like to incubate some eggs and I don’t want to waste any eggs. he doesn’t have a very big comb either. will I need to get a different rooster?

  29. Can anyone tell me the noise level of the Sapphire Gem? Not so much their chicken song when laying, but the constant noise level….I had 2 white rocks and a Lav Barred Rock, and I had to give them away, because they constantly made these purring noises, almost like a complaining noise every few seconds, all day long…and my other chickens don’t do this. It is like it wants attention…when the others go about their business. I have to be very conscious about noise level due to neighbors. I have black australorp, a wyandotte, a rhode island red and a columbian wyandotte, and they are all fairly low noise, unless laying.

    1. I’ve only had mine a few days, but they’re incredibly quiet chicks. Hardly hear a peep out of them! We’ve had chicks in our washroom since July and I love hearing them, so it’s definitely different. When I’m sitting with them, they make almost a regular bird warble/trill that is so beautiful (but very soft). We have two chatty Ranger roos and 9 one month old Wyandottes that love to peep a lot. The Jersey Giant pullets are very quiet for now too

  30. Our sapphire gem, went into the woods and is laying on a nest. Can I move her and the eggs back into the coop so she’s safe or will she abandon her eggs if I do ??

    She comes back once a day for food and water but I don’t want a skunk or other rodent to eat her and her eggs 😭

  31. Has anyone had a problem with their Sapphire gem mommas and their legs, we had one a couple weeks ago start to limp on her left side and it progressively got worse she stayed on the ground wouldn’t roost and got to the point she wouldn’t even leave the chicken house. We finally put her down the others seamed fine. The other day my next momma is now limping on the same left leg and is struggling to get around is this a genetic thing or my rooster?? any suggestions would be great!!

  32. I picked up five Sapphire Gem pullets from Tractor Supply Co, along with five Buff Orpingtons, to help my nephew augment his flock. Unfortunately, an alley cat broke into his coop and killed every chicken and chick, so these ten chicks came home with me to live in my backyard.

    All ten pullets matured into hens, all good layers starting at a few months old. We were wondering how we would cope if all ten survived, since we bought a coop rated for six max. An unexpected surprise was the SGs deciding that they preferred to sleep in the ficus tree next to the coop. One or two of the BOs figured out how to follow, so there’s plenty of room in the coop for the hens that bed down there.

    Another surprise is that most of the SGs lay green eggs, although there’re supposed to be brown. Nobody’s complaining, though. One hen in particular seems to lay giant, double-yolk eggs occasionally.

    The SGs are also very friendly, which is somewhat of a problem because they will run for an open door to get inside the house.

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