Breeding questions

[love2grinchicke]

Hello!
I'm wanting to get started in breeding, but I need some help. I have 1 rooster, and 4-5 of each breed. Is it okay for the rooster to live full time with the flock? I've seen rooster pens, and breeding pens. Breeding pens are the one on one, rooster/hen, so that you get the parents you want, correct?

 

[Mrs. K]

You can of course do that put them in seperate pens. And really you just need to do that until you get enough eggs to incubate. However, mostly it is on places that have multiple roosters, and they want specific roosters with specific hens. Sometimes they put them together in small pens like that to get the fertility rate up.

However, 4-5 hens should not make much difference in fertility rates. Keep track of your cooking eggs, checking for fertilization every time you open an egg, and that should give you a pretty good idea how fertile the eggs are.

Now if you have a multi breed flock, with a single rooster then it is not such a problem, if the hens lay eggs that look different enough that you can recognize them, then just pick the eggs you want to hatch. The eggs out of the hen that matches the breed of the rooster.


Mrs K