#idk what the word 'equestrian' but for chocobos would be

[heretic-altias]

Still thinking about chocobos, I’ve always seen them as a fusion between horses and chickens as someone with experience with both animals, so have some fun headcanons. Below a cut bc my list is long. Feel free to add on, I’d imagine some stuff from larger birds like emus and ostriches would make nice additions but my family doesn’t own ostriches, we own chickens so that’s what I know about.

- Despite the ingame sleeping model for them laying down, they probably sleep standing up like horses most of the time and just lay down sometimes. Roosting would be a bit impractical for birds this big lol. That being said, they are built much better for laying down and getting back up than horses so they could potentially lay down more often than horses do. They'd certainly sit on a nest if they're brooding eggs, so honestly any amount of laying down you headcanon probably would make sense anyway. They probably mostly lay down to sunbathe, chickens do that irl.

- Chocobos dust bathe bathe like chickens do. It’s very cute.

- There are competitions other than racing for them, maybe similar to horse shows irl. Imagine a chocobo cross country jumping course or chocobo dressage, or for western riding reining or barrel racing (I suggest YouTubing/Googling any of these you don’t know to see what they are)

- Chocobo breeds can vary. Some are bred for riding or driving purposes more like irl horses while others are bred for egg laying or meat (I could never eat one, but in world people probably do unless it’s a cultural Nope) more like chickens are. Some are also bred for interesting color combinations. You should absolutely google different chicken breeds and imagine chocobos with those feathers, I especially like the ones with poofy head feathers. Since chocobos ingame have even more colors than I’ve seen in chickens though, I’ll dip into my knowledge of parrots too and suggest those as color ideas as well. My family has a blue and gold macaw, African gray, and my little black capped conure, all of which would look fantastic as chocobo colors in my opinion. Anything is possible really, not just the solid colors we get ingame or specific irl birds.

- Much like a lot of irl kids go through a ‘horse phase’, lots of eorzean kids go through a ‘chocobo phase’ where they’re absolutely obsessed. Those who discover it’s not just a phase like myself are the ones who will work with chocobos for life, be it as a hobby or career path.

- Chocobos aren’t as bad as chickens with their pecking order, but even horses might clash a little when first introduced. Turn out groups are planned pretty carefully. Between hens mostly though, see further down for why roosters are Problematic.

- There are trail ride places that offer chocobo rides for people with 0 experience. Much like irl, this causes people to insist it’s easy to ride them bc they ‘did it once on vacation’ or 'took a chocobo porter once'

- You cannot geld a bird. To my knowledge anyway, and honestly I don’t really want to know how if I’m wrong lol. This means male chocobos are like roosters. Rooster chocobos probably have the longer fancier looking tail feathers, and probably longer fancier feathers on their head too since the ingame model has a little crest there. They also have spurs. Roos are way meaner than hens usually, so most casual riding birds are probably hens. Some show circuits might not even allow roos to enter. It also means you can only keep one roo with a group of hens usually unless it’s a really big group. Roosters irl can be ok together if there are no hens, and the grand companies probably do this since roos would have the spurs to better attack with in battle. Probably a specific breed of chocobo, bred for well tempered roos to ride into battle. They’d still have to check who they’re turning out with who carefully to make sure they get along, but it is doable. So casual riding birds, mostly hens, war birds, mostly roos. People with very large pastures might keep a roo with their hens for protection though.

- Some breeds of hen might get broody fairly often. It means they’ll sit on eggs or in a nest if there are no eggs bc they really wanna hatch some. They’re probably brats and near impossible to ride unless you manage to drag them out of their nest so they’re on their feet. Some people dunk their chicken’s butt in cold water to try and break the broodiness irl, but with a chocobo you’d probably need to just take a hose and spray it bc they’re too big to dunk. I’d imagine the broody breeds aren’t really the riding breeds though, they’re probably used for hatching eggs laid by the desired breed. They probably breed for less broodiness in riding bird breeds.

- Roosters absolutely crow. I doubt it would sound exactly like an irl rooster, some loud drawn out variation of the kweh or the little whistle sound they make maybe? I’ll leave the exact sound of it up to your imagination. Good luck sleeping on the chocobo farm.

- Just like chickens I don't think theres really a way to tell a roo from a hen on hatch until they grow their feathers in and start to crow. Unless you get a specific breed that you can tell at birth, but most chickens it's a wait and see thing. We've got two chicks rn that my family is praying to the irl genetic rng gods to be girls since we can't keep them if they're roos. I'm sure similar situations have arisen hatching chocobos before, where someone can only keep the chick if it turns out to be a hen. Potential for a Tragic Backstory if your character raised and bonded with a chick that turned out to be a roo and had to give it up.

- They probably grow at a rate closer to horses than chickens. This could really be head cannoned either way, so feel free to say they grow as fast as chickens or ostriches or something if you wanna but as riding animals this just feels too fast in my opinion. That means you probably won't be saddling your chocobo till it's at least 3 or so. Egg incubation however is probably closer to birds since horses don't lay eggs. Chickens take 21 days to incubate and hatch, google says ostriches and emus take closer to the 40-50 day range and personally that longer time feels better to me since they're much larger than chickens. Looks like there was an ostrich fact in here after all huh.

- Lifespan is probably closer to horses, chickens don't actually live very long. Horses can live 25-30 years. I knew one that lived to be well over 30 though, so there are exceptions.

- If a baby chick is raised without a mother hen irl, they need to be raised in a pair or larger group or they'll get lonely as flock animals. With our chickens, the sibling they were raised with is usually their best buddy and they'll stick together when out free ranging fairly often. Chocobos are probably like this too. Horses are also herd animals and prefer to be kept in groups usually, so really it just makes sense for chocobos to be flock oriented.

- Paddocks and/or stalls probably need a big nest box type setup for the birds to lay their eggs in. But I doubt all chocobo breeds lay year round. Second ostrich fact, google says they only lay during breeding season. Chocos not bred for laying might work more like this, but I could see it varying based on breed. Most chickens actually stop producing eggs entirely when they're older, unless they're death layers. That's a specific type of chicken that'll lay for their entire life.

This is all I can think of for now, will add more if I think of anything else. I'm open to questions about horses or chickens if people want information for their own headcanons. I'm no expert, but my family keeps chickens and I own a horse so I at least have experience working around both that others out there might not have. Don't ask me about ostriches though. Find an ostrich farmer for that.