Best All-Around Chicken Breed?

[Amer]

First, I am sure all the breeds on the list, whether from a hatchery or breeder, will have hens weighing at least 6 pounds and roosters weighing 8 pounds. They all qualify.

The Barred Plymouth Rock and Rhode Island Red are also listed as 200 to 280 eggs a year. I think Australorps tend to be more broody, so I am pretty sure that Rhode Island Red will lay more eggs than the Australorp.

Whether people can use all those eggs is not relevant for this. But people might want to sell eggs for eating or hatching, or maybe they have a very large family.

The hatchery chickens are bred for production of eggs, usually. I think hatchery chickens would be great for what we are discussing here.

I beg to differ. Australorps have little tendency to broodiness, in fact, an Australorp hen holds the world record for most eggs laid in a year, 364 eggs in 365 days!
Of course, all chicken breeds can display broodiness, and it is important that the very beat chicken can reproduce!
After all, it is a balance of meat, eggs, and chicks.

And discussing hatchery birds, very few “dual purpose” hatchery birds have roosters which weigh over 7 pounds.

 

[Amer]

I actually question that.
Hatcheries don't breed to the standards laid out in the APA or anything but they still use the numbers that those breeds represent even if the lines don't represent it any more.

So if we're talking about birds from a hatchery I would say that barred rocks are right out. They're just not big enough, nowhere near.

X2
If you’d weigh the hatchery birds you’d notice they weigh a lot less than you would expect.
I don’t think my Jersey Giant weighed 8 pounds.
Walking into a show hall can be overwhelming for someone who is familiar with hatchery birds because of the enormous size differences. Even the show Leghorns are bigger than the hatchery barred Rocks!

 

[HaikuHeritageFarm]

The Houdan is *supposed* to be all of that, and getting them back to that is my personal goal.

 

[Bullitt]

I think we have to go by the standard for the breed, otherwise we have no basis in fact by which to judge.

Barred Plymouth Rocks are supposed to be 7 1/2 pounds for hens and 9 1/2 pounds for roosters. If the adult hatchery birds are not reaching the 6 pounds for hens and 8 pounds for roosters, there is something very wrong. If it is the case that they are that small, go elsewhere.

 

[Bullitt]

I beg to differ. Australorps have little tendency to broodiness, in fact, an Australorp hen holds the world record for most eggs laid in a year, 364 eggs in 365 days!
Of course, all chicken breeds can display broodiness, and it is important that the very beat chicken can reproduce!
After all, it is a balance of meat, eggs, and chicks.

And discussing hatchery birds, very few “dual purpose” hatchery birds have roosters which weigh over 7 pounds.

The Australorp is known for being more broody than the Rhode Island Red. Of course any breed can have broodiness.

One Australorp in Australia laid that many eggs. No other Australorp got close again. The White Leghorn now holds the world record for laying eggs. I believe it is 371 eggs in 364 days.

 

[Trevorusn]

X2
If you’d weigh the hatchery birds you’d notice they weigh a lot less than you would expect.
I don’t think my Jersey Giant weighed 8 pounds.
Walking into a show hall can be overwhelming for someone who is familiar with hatchery birds because of the enormous size differences. Even the show Leghorns are bigger than the hatchery barred Rocks!

This is very true. Unfortunately only found this out AFTER getting TSC Jerseys, there is a seemingly noticeable difference in size. I'll fully wait for total judgement as my pullets only hatched in April, but my ISA Browns who also hatched in April seem the same in both size and weight.

 

[Bullitt]

This is very true. Unfortunately only found this out AFTER getting TSC Jerseys, there is a seemingly noticeable difference in size. I'll fully wait for total judgement as my pullets only hatched in April, but my ISA Browns who also hatched in April seem the same in both size and weight.

I believe the Jersey Giants are slow growers. Hopefully they will fill out with time.

 

[ChocolateMouse]

"I think we have to go by the standard for the breed, otherwise we have no basis in fact by which to judge."

Well, I think that if the standard doesn't reflect experience it's hard. After all, the written standards are only an ideal and many chickens have drifted away from them. Hatchery orpingtons are only 2/3rds the size of the ones I see at shows. And many strains that in their "ideal" are the same can be different in practice. (Like barred and white rocks.)

Based on written ideals there's soooo many birds that fit the bill because every bird is exaggerated in some way in their advertising and no bird has flaws. Every bird is suddenly the most thrifty and hardy chicken that grows the fastest and lays a lot of eggs and is also nice and predator savvy and also dresses out fast but lives a long productive egg life... Every dual purpose chicken suddenly meets your needs. But in practice, something gives in somewhere.

I guess you have my suggestions though. I'd stick to them under ideal conditions or not.

 

[Bullitt]

Based on written ideals there's soooo many birds that fit the bill because every bird is exaggerated in some way in their advertising and no bird has flaws.

Can you name one breed based on the standard that would be better than the three on the contenders list?

 

[ChocolateMouse]

Can you name one breed based on the standard that would be better than the three on the contenders list?

Note that APA standards don't specify anything about any of the traits you're looking for. Eggs per year isn't part of a standard. Nor growth rates, carcass quality, etc... So I was more talking about written descriptions.

Orpingtons. I can find a few citations very quickly that claim they're very heat tolerant whereas real world application would tell us they're not.
(1) (2) (3)
The standard calls for an efficient egg layer, and they were once, but based on breeding more for show than utility they're not as good anymore.
The size of the birds says up to 7/10lbs (F/M), but most people find their (hatchery) Orpingtons to be MUCH smaller than that and fatty to boot.

But in their written ideal, they're top tier birds.

I can name a lot, mostly the ones you cut, that would probably be comparable.