BREEDING FOR PRODUCTION...EGGS AND OR MEAT.

[ConPollos]

I've been working with hunting dogs for about 20 years.  We've owned chickens for ten of those years as layers for a small egg hobby and now our New Hampshires. Our dogs and other dogs I have seen, have very high prey drive.  It is a tough mix when dealing with free range chickens, but can be dealt with.

Basic discipline is the first and foremost step in my training method for our dogs. Heel, whoa, sit, lay down, here, leave it, and hup are what I base all other experiences on for the pup.  If I say WHOA, that dog should stop immediately.  Doesn't matter if it's a chicken or another dog, it should stop.  After a while the pups learn that the chickens are off limits and that there is no fun to be found.  So they go in search of quail or pheasant, or a dead duck instead of the chicken.  They get rewarded for finding the other stuff.

Might not work with all dogs, but it works for us.  Electronic collars are a life saver when the pup starts to become a bullheaded teenager.  Reinforcing a command from across a field is a very nice ability.

Well said! Thank you

 

[ConPollos]

Those Catahoula are a lot like this Tennessee brindle mountain cur I ended up with as a pup at a shelter. He was supposed to have been a boxer mastiff mix, NOT! He is so high strung it isn't funny. Had him in the house forthe first yr. Brought him in this winter when it was -25 windchill, lasted two days, up all night pacing and whining loud. I think he prefers to be outside. I have him tied up next to the chicken coop, no predator problems anymore. I don't trust him with the chickens though lol. Thought about training him on racoons, have friends that coon hunt with English redtics. I don't eat coons though, and it doesn't appeal to me anyway. He goes bezeark bonkers over squirrels running through the trees. I've never hunted squirrel with a dog but I've hunted rabbits with beagles for yrs. Watched some YouTube vids on squirrel hunting with dogs, looks like fun, and I will eat squirrel lol!

He needs at least one hour of running per day. Fetch, fly ball, frisbee, agility class, pbedience class jogging with you, running alongside your bike or horse, anything. He also needs the mental stimulation of challenging doggy games daily, at the very least having his dinner packed hard into a Kong, or scatter his kibble over a large area of your yard so he has to sniff out each piece. There are so many fun ways.to stimulate him, and then he'll be a mellow dog. One 10 minute clicker training session will exhaust him as much as a long walk.

Being tied isn't good for that type of doggie, and it can make him bonkers and aggressive.

My neighbor's Mountain Cur wears an electronic collar that prevents her from crossing boundaries. For her
it works great.

 

[Beer can]

Were fortunate we live away from the road and have big farm fields around us. He runs, and boy does he run, like a greyhound. After about an hour he'll start listening to me. I do not trust him with the chickens though. The silkie pen is closest to him, when I'm out feeding them he goes nuts like he wants to make snacks out of them, maybe he wants to play with them? Jumps straight up and down like a pogo stick or he has springs in his feet, about four foot straight up feet level repeatedly. Since I've had him up by the coops I've lost no more chickens even though he isn't loose at night he must repeal them.

 

[MBK Farm]

I don't know about most folks on here but as for me, this is not a business. I don't keep ledgers, keep track of weights and finished carcass weights, I do keep egg count any given year and I do KNOW what is produced~because we eat it and so we notice when we have shelves full of meat or baskets full of eggs for consumption and when we do not have that amount on any given year, though I don't write it down for posterity. For me this is just food production with some intentional breeding in the middle of it. Discussion, no matter what kind, allows one to bounce ideas off one another and is valuable even when not dealing in specific units of measurement.

I love it when people get on these threads and demand that people produce their records for their perusal so they can somehow match that up with some worth in their minds, as if folks just farming and raising chickens isn't enough, they have to PROVE they are farming and raising chickens to some stranger on the internet or it's just a figment of our imagination otherwise. No rubber and no road, apparently, if you don't keep a ledger of activities going on in the coop.

Yes, it is entirely possible to know if one is making improvements in production, in the flock and even in the breed just by LOOKING at what you've done each year as you go along. It doesn't have to be written down chapter and verse before it's real. Maybe for you that is so, but for folks who actually enjoy food production at their own place, adding all that extra work into just takes the enjoyment right out of it....unless, of course, you enjoy that sort of thing, which I don't.

And, yet...the rubber is still meeting the road here as I feed my family and extended family on the food produced here and see the flock improving in those efforts each year.

Nobody is "demanding" anything out of you, Beekissed. You're happy with your results with your flock, great, happy for you. Don't keep records? Who cares? Don't have any tracking metrics or evaluation criteria either, then more power to you. Don't want to share any secrets to your outstanding success either, that's cool too. Keep on with your great results in your section of the world feeding your family through LOOKING at your chickens.

 

[Beekissed]

Why, thank you!!! So gracious of you to allow me to carry on in my endeavors as planned.

 

[ShaVirginia]

Just curious! Wanted to dabble with a few chicks for year round eggs in NW. My misc. americaunas crosses lay brown, blue, green & sometimes pink. I bought 2 Icelandic roosters; got my hatching eggs, and gave away roosters.
I hatched 12 eggs in 50 yo incubator and got 12 chicks; half and half, in wild colors.
Will keep the 6 old hens and the 6 pullets.
Any suggestions on next outcross?
Have raised horses for last 40 yrs, and various chicken and dog projects; but, ready for something smaller!
Regards

 

[HeritageGoose13]

Just curious! Wanted to dabble with a few chicks for year round eggs in NW. My misc. americaunas crosses lay brown, blue, green & sometimes pink. I bought 2 Icelandic roosters; got my hatching eggs, and gave away roosters.
I hatched 12 eggs in 50 yo incubator and got 12 chicks; half and half, in wild colors.
Will keep the 6 old hens and the 6 pullets.
Any suggestions on next outcross?
Have raised horses for last 40 yrs, and various chicken and dog projects; but, ready for something smaller!
Regards

I know someone on BYC (forget who) sells birds called Sapphires or Super Blue Egg Layers. I think they are a cross of Ameraucana and Leghorn, and they are supposed to lay blue eggs most of the year I think.

 

[collie1470]

The EE/leghorn crosses got brought up on a thread I started not long ago. They sound fun, for sure. I can just imagine lots and lots of rainbow egg baskets <3

 

[hellbender]

Just curious! Wanted to dabble with a few chicks for year round eggs in NW. My misc. americaunas crosses lay brown, blue, green & sometimes pink. I bought 2 Icelandic roosters; got my hatching eggs, and gave away roosters.
I hatched 12 eggs in 50 yo incubator and got 12 chicks; half and half, in wild colors.
Will keep the 6 old hens and the 6 pullets.
Any suggestions on next outcross?
Have raised horses for last 40 yrs, and various chicken and dog projects; but, ready for something smaller!
Regards

I'm sorry but this sounds like just so much xenoglossia and I am at my wit's end, trying to figure out exactly what you need. Could you be a bit more specific? There are a few people who come here who are more than capable to help with just about any interest you may have.

RON aka Hellbender

 

[JRNash]

Hey Hellbender,no fair I had to look that word up