Kelowna woman crochets warm hats for hundreds of lucky chickens

A Kelowna woman has her hands full with orders for chicken hats this year.

It's the first time Candace Suderman has crocheted the tiny toques and she already has over 130 orders going to various customers in B.C. since starting the venture in early December.

“I make all colours of the rainbow, whatever customers want,” she said. “I guess people like them, I just received another order for 100 chicken hats.”

Suderman put an ad out on a variety of online classified pages in the Okanagan earlier this month that are bringing in orders and making people laugh.

“Keep your chickens warmer with a cute hat to keep their comb warm,” the post reads. “Chickens like attention….and it’s getting colder!”

Suderman crochets each one by hand and created her own pattern by looking at a picture. The hats come with soft strings for tying underneath the chicken’s chin.

Extreme cold weather can cause frostbite on the combs of chickens and roosters. The little hats could come in handy.

“The hats are for their comb so it doesn’t freeze,” she said. “The comb gets black or grey colours on it if it does get frost bit. If they look different than the other chickens, the other chickens will pick on them, sometimes to death.”

Suderman crochets knits and hats for little dogs along with the chicken hats through her online business.

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