Chicken Math

[kinsey228]

Quote:
I commend you for being so involved ! Most "kids" now days spend too much time doing useless stuff. Well done !

 

[sherylreno]

My DH said it was time to get chickens again so I asked him how many are you thinking and he said 3 hens. I did the egg math and told him well we go through 2 dozen eggs per week and from what I see we need at least 6 hens if not more. He said nope we only need 3 because we will get 3 eggs everyday from them so we will be fine. We go to the feed store together and I ordered 5 chicks and the girl asked me if I ever had a BLR and of course I said no and ordered that one too, ended up with 6 pullets. Then the BLR ended up being a him not a her and I put it up on craigslist, he was gone in 1 hour. Then my friend had to move and needed to get rid of her chooks, so I went over with my DH and he picked out 2 hens but my friend said hey I tell you what I'll give you another hen and you give me eggs and of course I said yes. So we now have 8 hens - I think the math worked out great since we only have 4 laying right now and our average is 3 per day just like my DH said he wanted but when they all are laying I wonder what our average will be then?

Oh and I told my DH he needs to build a bigger coop because next year I want to get a couple more pullets and he said well I want some ducks now, so as we say, here we go again. I'm now researching ducks, he wanted 2 and so far I'm up to 4 with the duck math.

 

[Kountreefok]

Already had a small flock of old layers (16 or so) and a roo or two that would provide a few chicks every year when Honey decided to indulge my dream of a mixed breeding flock by magically manifesting the KoopDaJal one day while I was at work three years ago.
Selected about 8 dual-purpose breeds for traits like cold hardiness, tendency to brood, mothering, disposition, etc. Added a few "heavy assorted" to make things more interesting. Ordered 100 day old hatchery straight-runs for the breeding flock planning on keeping 30-40 (shifting eyes to ceiling...ummm....ish...teeheehee) layers + 1 roo per 8 to 10 hens, culls to freezer world. Older, wiser flock integrated in for winter.

Worked well but the girls were still a bit challenged catching up to my self-multiplication program last year and we were selling all the extra eggs they could produce, some hatching eggs, and culls. Needed more chickens! Honey fixed my frustration by throwing incubators at it.

Some in, some out over winter...neighborly exchanges, etc. Way too many roos come this last spring. Culled, culled, culled to 47 hens, 9 roos beginning of spring. Got 7 broodies and ran incubators set to a synchronized hatch with them (having sold off all our previous [current seaon] incubator babies except the latest about a week ahead of the group hatch date.) Hoping to integrate all chicks with mommies which we did at day old with huge success!

But the girls were taking a beating from too many roos. Meantime able to sell more eggs than they can lay and more birds than we are breeding/culling.

Breeding season over culled roos to 3 and culled an egg eater...after I decided that it was easier to break the news to Honey about a late hatch than to explain "next season" to 3 very sweet broodies. Girls response...loving gratitude and diligently tending their nests. Honey's response: a moment of silence complete with that thoughtful, patient "I live with a lunatic" look (I know ya'll know the one I mean) then..."they'll be hatching out around your birthday then."

He's not patient--he's as crazy as I am!

He'd already planned (voluntarily...his idea!) to extend the old chicken run. Then last week stacking hay he looks at the space between the bale stack and the new coop and asks "How much more run do we want?" He's thinking run for the east wing of our two room coop.
I've been hanging out at BYC. I've seen pix of purdy, purdy, purdy

dark brown eggs. And I want more blue and green ones. I'm thinking breeding pens!
Stayed tuned for next seasons episode: New blood for bird size, and, bird and egg color aka...chcken calculus!

 

[PTFowl]

Did you know that chicken math works even when you just have the chickens and coop on order and they haven't arrived yet? I started out with a smaller coop on order that only holds up to 8 chickens and I was going to cap it at 5 chickens. Now I'm considering adding 2 more chickens for a total of 7 and, upgrading the coop to a larger size that holds up to 15.

 

[Amethyste]

We have 7 hens in our little flock atm.

I am TRYING to convince DH that a flock =1 chicken, so we can have a few more "chickens".

Well, I don't think he is falling for that one yet...but I am working it hard

 

[MommyMagpie]

Does chicken math work when you have an old hen who isn't laying any more and is awaiting departure for freezer camp? So how many chickens do I have if I have two older hens, one not laying and the other laying 2-3x a week, and two girls who just started and are laying about every other day?

I'm thinking it's either 1 1/2 or 2 but I can't decide.

And these are supposed to be my son's 4H project, yeah riiiiiiight.....

 

[ChickenSahib]

Heh, I initially wanted a RIR, a BO, and a BR. The feed store only had RIR and the other interested one was L. Brahma. I ended up with 2RIR and a L. Brahma. Next time I went, they had all sorts of variety and some BR's! I had to resist the urge since the coop im building right now can only handle 3~4 max.

I guess we'll have to wait until egg production significantly drops to start brooding some more chicks if you catch my drift

 

[cat1994]

Quote:
I commend you for being so involved ! Most "kids" now days spend too much time doing useless stuff. Well done !

Lol that’s funny I know a lot of people that would call what I have been doing for the past six yrs useless, but anyway I have to be way involved after all b/c as my dad often reminds me “You got in to chickens not me.” lol so I am the one caring for them and deciding weather to get more birds or not, who to cull or keep and all that jazz. What’s really funny is the story of how I got into chickens in the first place. I had never ever considered having chickens at all (or any other feathered animal for that matter just horses), when I got a phone call from my gram asking if I wanted two eggs that were hatching right then. She had collected a dozen of eggs from my uncle’s hen house and had accidentally taken two eggs from a nest that belonged to a broody hen that had already left with chicks that had hatched earlier; when she got home she put the eggs in the refrigerator. A few minuets later she realized two eggs in the carton were hatching in the refrigerator! So she called me up and asked if I would come and take them so I said yes reluctantly and we got the two eggs that were peeping and put them under a lamp in my room. I watched them hatch that night… long story sort six yrs later I have way more chickens! Lol I feel in LOVE lol those two chicks will always be my miracle chicks that changed my life for good