Bird Parentage Testing Kit?

[speckledhen]

Quote:
Well, then you have about 34 roosters too many in each pen. Poor hens. As far as testing goes, you're looking for something that doesn't exist. If you separate your birds, then you'll know who the parents of the chicks are.

 

[rodriguezpoultry]

Quote:
Then what's the point? Are they all the same breed?

Plus, you'll only need approx. 1 rooster per 10 hens, 2 at the absolute most.

 

[Sir Birdaholic]

Quote:

 

[tnchickenut]

I'm a tad confused. Why would you feed 40 roosters? If you want a backyard hatchery, you only need to fertilize the hen's eggs and that doesn't take 40:60 ratio. That is bad buisness as I like to say things. You should be wanting to make money, not waste it on feeding birds that don't lay eggs.

 

[cubalaya]

after reading the op's backyard page, my advise would be to have 5 pens with 12 hens and 1 rooster in each pen. that means 35 roosters could go to new homes or freezer camp.

 

[bigchicken2]

My hens are fine! If this was a problem people would be killing all the junglefowl roos too. Most of my hens live free-range so
I get eggs from them. Half of the unwanted roos get killed or rehomed. So I actually have about 25% roos 75% hens. I'm keeping the extra roos because I don't want to be a "Chicken Lover" (roo hater, egg lover) I don't have a backyard hatchery. I have a HUGE hatchery with 100 birds per pen not 100 birds in all. The pens are big enough for them tho.

 

[rodriguezpoultry]

Quote:
Please elaborate.

 

[bigchicken2]

Quote:
Please elaborate.

Most people who have chickens call themselves chicken lovers and don't care about roos and just keep chickens for eggs. Most of them have 0-2 roos and kill all their sons.

 

[speckledhen]

Quote:
I'm sorry, I'm confused. At first you said you have 40 roosters and 60 hens in each pen. Then you said they free range. You want testing for parentage, but as I said and others, there is no such thing that we know of, so the only way to know which birds are the parents of which chicks is to separate them. That was on topic, I believe. I think some of us are just confused by some of what you've said.

First you said you haven't started a hatchery, then you said you have a huge one, so I'm not sure if you do or don't. Are you preparing to open one, then? Just trying to clarify. You'll need your breeders separated and not too many roosters with the hens or they can actually be killed by overmating.

 

[tnchickenut]

I got a question too (in addition to how you have free ranging pens)... what breeds do you have that you have 100 birds each? and also what is the name of your hatchery? Do you have a site? (I'm seriously asking here)