Breed suggestions

[carterd757]

Hi All;
I hope im posting in right area,as I am new here. Anyhow I will be retiring from the Navy in a year and a half and I am going to raise chickens for my own/families consumption. Any suggestions as to a good all around breed for eggs/meat?

Thanks in advance
Dave

 

[justusnak]

Hi Dave, and welcome.

My husband retired from the AF in 2000.....and we now have a small farm, and 60 plus chickens. What a great hobby we have! LOL For eggs....I just love my Rhode Island Reds. These gals layed right through the winter. However...with a single comb...frostbite is something you will have to watch for in the winter. We are also raiseing Buff Orpingtons. They are a dual purpose bird...lay large brown eggs..and are supposed to be great table birds. Im sure many people will have different suggestions. Congrats on your retirement, thanks for being there for us all.....and enjoy the retired life! We are!!

 

[alex]

oh, a good breed for eggs are Stars, Rhode Islands, Australorps, and Ancona's. They all lay excellent (5/wk), witch means with the good health and all they should lay 5 eggs a week.
GOOD LUCK!
-alex

 

[BirdBrain]

Dave,
You know what I would do if I were you? I would order the free catalog from McMurrays and have a look at all the breeds they have to offer. Then I would go over to TSC and buy the lovely new book from Storey Publishing. They have a new book out (Encyclopedia?) with wonderful photographs of all these breeds and tons of information about each one. I am hoping that I will be able to have a flock in about the same time frame as you and have been refining my wish list. I have raised meat birds and ended up with some lovely cochin roos (as extra warmer birds) that now live at my parents ranch. The birds that I would want are probably different than you due to climate and egg color, etc. I am dying to have some Buff Orpingtons and some Marans, Wellsummers, Americaunas, and of all things, Turkens. I think it might be interesting to have a Minorca and an Australorp as well.

Have fun with your new addiction!!
Bird

 

[equine chick]

I agree with the above poster, this will be your time on boning up on learning about your chickens. I love delawares though, red stars, buff orpingtons, austrlops and marans. I have several other breeds but these are my favorites because of their personities. Mine are still pretty young but we are waiting on our first eggs. If possible attend some county fairs there are so many kinds of chickens there. Everytime i go i find more breeds i just got to have.

 

[Country Gal]

Hi Carterd... I'm up in Michigan, so when I ordered my chickens I was specifically looking for "winter hardy" birds... I have Buff Orpingtons, Light Brahmas, and Silver Laced Wyandottes. All three will lay brown eggs, have good temperments, are winter hardy, and should be tasty on the table (all based on the info out of the McMurray catalog!).

 

[Rooster01]

Welcome Dave

If you just want eggs, Rhode Island Reds are the way to go. They are wonderful layers. They lay even if it bitter cold outside and the summer heat doesn't seem to slow them down. Plus they lay good even when they get a little age on them. RIRs are calm, but they ones I've had aren't very friendly.

 

[Matt Berry]

I have a mixture of Australorps, RIR, Barred Rocks and Silver Laced Wyndottes. The Australorps are very quiet, and have more of a tendency to be easily scared and shy. The SLW are curious, but can be wary. The RIR one is super friendly and is the first to great me, the other one is a little more shy, but they are both great birds. The barred rocks vary, most are great, friendly and adventurous, a couple are a little mean (Roo's the worst one is named chicken dinner), but even with the Roo's most of them are pretty friendly.

As with anything the breed in general will have it's quirks, but a lot of it will come down to the specific chicken.

My favorites are the RIR and Barred Rocks, Followed by the Australorps and finally the SLW.

 

[carterd757]

Thank You All for the wonderful suggestions,and I guess I was right to start studying so soon after all.

Dave

 

[MTtroutwithwings]

Hi Dave,
I'm new to BYC as well but have received a lot information from the site for a couple of months to get started so here is my first response! I too went through McMurray's Hatchery, received a catalog from the local feed store and went to their website at www.mcmurrayhatchery.com. They have great information on best egg layers/meat combo to help out. We do not eat poultry but wanted brown egg layers so we went for they're assortment package! Great variety but you won't know the breeds you'll get until they're old enough to ID and McMurray doesn't make a list of they're "grab bag" specials. We received our 27 babies (ordered 25 but they throw in extras which I also learned about from BYC) July 2nd, all healthy and doing well. The only one identifiable right off the bat was the Turken, they look like earless poodles with wings!
Hope they help on your decision, they're alot of fun so far!

Best of luck,
Lori