14 Chicks, may have to give up four, which ones ?.

[Ilovemy3babies]

We have 14 chicks, we may have to cut down to 10, due to space. The last three are our newest ones , only 4 days old. Not sure who to part with. We are so attached already, we purchased fthem for egg production mainly. My hubby thinks we should wait make sure we have no boys and everyone makes out ok. All were purchase from the feed store.

We have
4 productive reds
2 Buff Orpington
2 Barred Rocks
3 Ameraucanas
2 Black Marna's
1 Barnelveder

 

[Jetblack2004]

That's hard. Perhaps you should wait like your husband says...?
Maybe two of the Productive Reds and one of the Ameraucanas. That's only three though. I don't know about the fourth one!

Hope it works out,

-Jet

 

[ColoRockies]

Your husband is correct in my opinion. You may lose one or yeah... rooster. Either way, a 10 and 14 chicken difference really isn't much of a difference. If really needed you'd probably have the best luck finding someone at the feed store to adopt the youngest

 

[TLWR]

Hold off to see if you have any boys or if you purchased pullets, then do as above, narrow down to 2 of each and then decide which other one to add to the three.

 

[Ilovemy3babies]

Thank you, we will wait it out for sure and see what we end up with. We have a friend who take the 4 babies.

 

[donrae]

I agree on waiting to weed out any Oops cockerels. By 6 weeks you should know for sure who is what gender.

Myself, with an eye toward higher egg production, would get rid of two of the Reds, one of the Orps, and either one of the Marans or the Barnevelder. Granted, the Reds are probably going to be your best layers, but the Rocks will be a close second. Buff Orps, not stellar layers and tend to go broody, so that also interrupts egg supply. Marans and Barnevelders aren't bred for high rates of production. EE can be, but they're kind of a crapshoot as far as how many eggs they'll lay.