Hi Everyone, Hopefully in a month we will be ready to take in our first peep's. We are looking to get #1 Friendly #2 Egg Layers #3 good for the SW kentucky enviorment. Anyone have ideas? Milezone
If you were going for just eggs I would say leghorns or sex links but with friendly being first I would say orpingtons or brahmas. Being located where you are, most any of the common breads will do just fine in your area.
The leghorn for white, the sex-link in RED for the brown eggs. Nothing else even comes close to feed conversion or total eggs laid, if eggs are your goal. With feed being expensive, it's the only way to go. If you want more a breed for other reasons, then your choices are wide open.
#1 Friendly #2 Egg Layers #3 good for the SW kentucky enviorment = Opingtons,Sussex and Barred rocks. All the leghorn I have had have been flighty. http://www.ithaca.edu/staff/jhenderson/chooks/chooks.html
I have to diverge. I'm in south central KY, and the absolute BEST layer I've ever owned is my Australorp. She's also been my head hen for several years and is friendly, though not in a lap-chicken sort of way. Loves to walk up and talk to me. Going on 5 years old, I still get at least 4 eggs from her a week. She's never had problems in the extremely unpredictable weather here. I've had GC's, but their laying dramatically slacked off after 1 year. My sussex is a good layer/friendly, but doesn't lay the same sized eggs that the Aussie girl does. They were also much more aggressive than she was. Same goes for my delaware. I wasn't impressed by the Orpingtons rate of lay, nor with my Brahmas (though they are friendly).