Farming and Homesteading Heritage Poultry

[catdaddyfro]

Quote:
My apologies Mr. Robert Blosl...



So basically you are stating that I could NOT have a sustainable flock with 3-4 good quality roos and 4 dozen good quality hens that were not separated? I would assume that using active culling of weak and "trait-less" birds you could keep the flock strong; however, it appears that I am not understanding something. Could you clarify why it wouldn't work?

My apologies for striking a nerve, that was not my intention. I am just trying to figure this stuff out. I have a wife, 8 kids, 2 dogs, and nearly 50 chickens so sustainability is something that I strive for. Currently we grow, hunt, or raise about 40% of our food and we are looking to increase that quite a bit. We have plans, but we are doing our homework before we dive in.

Sure it will work if you have all good stock Four RIR males(for example only) and 48 RIR hens flock mated will produce a hugemoungous amount of RIR offspring. It may not produce many/or no 92 or higher point scoring "showbirds" but non-the-less they will be all RIRs. The penning and breeding methods of two hens and one good male or one on one or even 4 hens and one male is breeding to set certain traits or for trying to make for one or two awesome spectacular one in 2 or 3 hundred typey offspring, is all. IMO

For Farming or Homesteading you can run and use flock/clan mating and do good as long as you get what you want from them(meat/eggs or both) your choice. Good Shepard farms is a good example(clan/flock mating) I think someone referred to it earlier(he gets what he wants and MAKES MONEY at it too) I think I've seen references to him getting $50 bucks a pop for a dressed gourmet rooster and pretty much has standing orders year long for stock, eggs and meat.

Jeff

PS don't worry too much about striking nerves, they'll flinch but soon return, its good to have ones reflexes checked often more so than not. keeps everything in check and lets one know if they are still living or not. LOL

 

[Fred's Hens]

Ok, just to put my non requested two cents in here. We've got 90 birds, at least, on the ground at the boy's place in KY and there's 8 or 9 kids there, although not really relevant. LOL

No flock breeding. No no. There's only those select few females that are chosen and only two or three great males each year. So, basically our breeding program is not much different than the breeding program employed by Bob and the other "show folks". Yes, we use time honored methods of line breeding, and family lines. No big deal.

We don't need to collect fertile hatching eggs indiscriminately from all 60 females on the property. Goodness sake. That would absolutely push the flock backward. That's all BGMatt was trying to say, I think.

From small breeding pens of two select cocks and a half dozen of our best selected pullets, we can hatch out 100 chicks in a pretty short order, just over a month. If you can hatch out 100 great chicks, from selective breeding, why would you hatch fertile eggs, willy-nilly in a non selective way through flock breeding? It's a head scratcher. Maybe I'm missing something here.

 

[lcahill]

Ok, just to put my non requested two cents in here. We've got 90 birds, at least, on the ground at the boy's place in KY and there's 8 or 9 kids there, although not really relevant. LOL

No flock breeding. No no. There's only those select few females that are chosen and only two or three great males each year. So, basically our breeding program is not much different than the breeding program employed by Bob and the other "show folks". Yes, we use time honored methods of line breeding, and family lines. No big deal.

We don't need to collect fertile hatching eggs indiscriminately from all 60 females on the property. Goodness sake. That would absolutely push the flock backward. That's all BGMatt was trying to say, I think.

From small breeding pens of two select cocks and a half dozen of our best selected pullets, we can hatch out 100 chicks in a pretty short order, just over a month. If you can hatch out 100 great chicks, from selective breeding, why would you hatch fertile eggs, willy-nilly in a non selective way through flock breeding? It's a head scratcher. Maybe I'm missing something here.

Thanks! I needed to hear an explanation. (Your two cents are very welcomed here) As I said, we do our homework before we jump into a project. I would also like an explanation about WHY it would drive a flock backwards, just so I know. Someone just telling me no won't satisfy me, I need to hear the ins and outs of why, so thank you.
New question: I've only raised chickens, never bred them so what would the space requirements be for the aforementioned breeding pens. As a homestead family we really watch our pennies so having size requirements would be nice. Not "rules of thumbs", maybe personal pens as examples.

 

[BGMatt]

Ok, just to put my non requested two cents in here. We've got 90 birds, at least, on the ground at the boy's place in KY and there's 8 or 9 kids there, although not really relevant. LOL

No flock breeding. No no. There's only those select few females that are chosen and only two or three great males each year. So, basically our breeding program is not much different than the breeding program employed by Bob and the other "show folks". Yes, we use time honored methods of line breeding, and family lines. No big deal.

We don't need to collect fertile hatching eggs indiscriminately from all 60 females on the property. Goodness sake. That would absolutely push the flock backward. That's all BGMatt was trying to say, I think.

From small breeding pens of two select cocks and a half dozen of our best selected pullets, we can hatch out 100 chicks in a pretty short order, just over a month. If you can hatch out 100 great chicks, from selective breeding, why would you hatch fertile eggs, willy-nilly in a non selective way through flock breeding? It's a head scratcher. Maybe I'm missing something here.

This is a good post, and perhaps says what I was trying to say better than I did. Basically by flock breeding and not selective breeding, you allow stagnation and regression to the mean over time. With selective breeding you can continue to push the desired traits, whatever they may be, forward.

 

[Fred's Hens]

For me, it is a pen in our barn. No different than a juvenile pen. 10x12 with nests. That's it. No big deal. Just a place to know who is mating with who. Better said, who's eggs are these? With cows, a farmer may only have one bull on the property or being administering straws to select heifers in heat, let's say. But again, it is purposeful and targeted reproduction.

Down in KY we also use a mating tractor. It looks just like a normal tractor but it has nest boxes the are accessible from the outside for easy egg collection. I'd say it is 10x6 and 40"' high. Again, just a place to contain a cock and his little select harem for a month of targeted egg collection.

The word mating or mating pens ought not scare people off. It simply means to my mind a way to be assured, really assured which eggs I'm hatching that's all. If one just collects unknown eggs from unknown match ups in flock mating, that isn't being a breeder, that's just a hatcher. Hope that helps

 

[catdaddyfro]

For me, it is a pen in our barn. No different than a juvenile pen. 10x12 with nests. That's it. No big deal. Just a place to know who is mating with who. Better said, who's eggs are these? With cows, a farmer may only have one bull on the property or being administering straws to select heifers in heat, let's say. But again, it is purposeful and targeted reproduction.

Down in KY we also use a mating tractor. It looks just like a normal tractor but it has nest boxes the are accessible from the outside for easy egg collection. I'd say it is 10x6 and 40"' high. Again, just a place to contain a cock and his little select harem for a month of targeted egg collection.

The word mating or mating pens ought not scare people off. It simply means to my mind a way to be assured, really assured which eggs I'm hatching that's all. If one just collects unknown eggs from unknown match ups in flock mating, that isn't being a breeder, that's just a hatcher. Hope that helps

Exactly I agree but this thread is farming and homesteading heritage poultry, not a breeding thread those are another thread. So even though I don't do flock mating (well I do in my production chickens as the only trait I need there is for them to spit out big eggs and lots of them never went backwards on that one for sure). But are you saying that a flock bred bunch of "Heritage" RIRs are still not "Heritage" RIIRs I think they would be, maybe not the cream of the crop but they will for sure be a farm worthy group of RIRs. They aren't going to morph into an unidentifiable bunch of red chickens from this is what I'm saying. Just look at the BRs and NHs from Good Shepards they still look like what they are supposed to be and do the job they are supposed to do are they going to win a "beauty show" from taking a random one or few from on of those flocks/groups? I doubt it very seriously but if they are true to breed without any other blood added to them, then they still are "heritage" breeds of chickens and I will say it till I'm blue in the face. YOU don't have to breed show chickens for them to be what they are supposed to be. Question out of 500 hundred "heritage" chickens bred how many are going to score top points at a show,? I say, not very many but they are still true to breed chickens. Winners or not.

Jeff

 

[BGMatt]

Exactly I agree but this thread is farming and homesteading heritage poultry, not a breeding thread those are another thread. So even though I don't do flock mating (well I do in my production chickens as the only trait I need there is for them to spit out big eggs and lots of them never went backwards on that one for sure). But are you saying that a flock bred bunch of "Heritage" RIRs are still not "Heritage" RIIRs I think they would be, maybe not the cream of the crop but they will for sure be a farm worthy group of RIRs. They aren't going to morph into an unidentifiable bunch of red chickens from this is what I'm saying. Just look at the BRs and NHs from Good Shepards they still look like what they are supposed to be and do the job they are supposed to do are they going to win a "beauty show" from taking a random one or few from on of those flocks/groups? I doubt it very seriously but if they are true to breed without any other blood added to them, then they still are "heritage" breeds of chickens and I will say it till I'm blue in the face. YOU don't have to breed show chickens for them to be what they are supposed to be. Question out of 500 hundred "heritage" chickens bred how many are going to score top points at a show,? I say, not very many but they are still true to breed chickens. Winners or not.

Jeff

Show or not show has nothing to do with it. Flock breeding will lead to decreased production eventually as well, which is the point that Fred (I think) was trying to make, and the point I was trying to make earlier. By the way, yes a lot of the Good Shepard birds would place very well at shows. Don't get all the anti-SOP stuff, since it was written for most breeds with production being at the forefront at a time where the whole "show chickens" thing was not anywhere near as important as the birds doing their job.

Breeding is central to any poultry operation. Unless you truly want to go back to the days of 75-100 eggs per bird, per year is a good producing bird for your homestead. Selective breeding for egg production and body traits which promote egg production is how they raised those numbers. With just mass flock breeding, you will very quickly go back to those low production standards that they had in the mid 1800's.

 

[maryhysong]

Quote:
My apologies Mr. Robert Blosl...



So basically you are stating that I could NOT have a sustainable flock with 3-4 good quality roos and 4 dozen good quality hens that were not separated? I would assume that using active culling of weak and "trait-less" birds you could keep the flock strong; however, it appears that I am not understanding something. Could you clarify why it wouldn't work?

It sort of depends on what you want as the end result. If you just want a bunch of chickens it will work fine. If you want birds that meet the SOP so you can sell some as breeding stock it won't work at all. If you want really productive birds that make market weight quickly or lay well, then it probably wont' work for that in the long run either.

And why is that? Because every bird is different and has a slightly different genetic make up. Just as the children in the family all resemble each other but are not identical and in some cases look radically different from each other, so with chickens and other animals. Even good looking birds do not always produce good looking children. Sometimes there will be only one or two animals out of 100 that should be kept and bred, the rest should go to the freezer.

You *could* have a sustainable flock of chickens if what you are meaning is a flock of birds that can fend for themselves to an extent and can reproduce themselves. They will in general look and act like the birds you started with, but in the end there will be no *improvement* over the birds you started with and very likely their type and productivity will go down hill.

If you allow 4 roos and 48 hens to breed willynilly and you by chance spot a great looking bird in the offspring, how are you going to know where it came from? Which combination of which roo and which hen gave you that bird? You wont' and with that many birds it will be very difficult to find out. A much better plan would be to buy as many chicks of your chosen breed from the breeder with the best looking birds you can find. (and don't be afraid to ask questions about laying ability, time to table weight, ect) OR buy a started trio, much more costly in the case of really fine birds, but may be money saving in the end.

If you buy chicks, watch them as they grow out, which ones grow faster and reach table size first?, Which pullet lays first? Now, do they conform to the SOP (if that is part of your goals) or go through them and give them the Hogan Test (https://play.google.com/books/reade...r&output=reader&authuser=0&hl=en&pg=GBS.PA128) and pick the ones that will be the best for your purpose. Even if you just keep the cream of the crop, say one cockerel and 2-4 pullets for breeding it will not take long to raise a good number of the next generation. When just starting out with a breed or strain you might want to single mate the birds so that you can ID and separate the chicks at hatch. That way you can compare which hen with that boy gives you the best offspring. Then you can repeat that mating for more of the better quality birds.

If you are breeding willy nilly and something shows up that shouldn't be there, how are you going to trace down the birds responsible? For example, yellow legs in a breed that should have white ones? What if one or more of your hens and one of your cock birds carries a gene for yellow legs but don't show it. Then you get a percentage of chicks with yellow legs. Sure you can cull those chicks but without selective, controlled breeding you will never find the source of it so that it can be eliminated from the flock. And in the meantime a percentage of the birds with white legs are ALSO carrying the gene for yellow legs, so it's going to continue to show up in increasing numbers each year. That is how indiscriminate breeding takes a flock backwards.

 

[lcahill]

Basically by flock breeding and not selective breeding, you allow stagnation and regression to the mean over time. With selective breeding you can continue to push the desired traits, whatever they may be, forward.

What's wrong with average? The mean would be average. "Allow stagnation and regression to the mean over time"...why, how? I guess I just don't understand how a breed could go backward? If the hen and roo are true to breed to start with, and reproduce, the offspring would still be true to breed. Like catdaddyfro stated below:

Quote: I'm trying to glean and learn as much as possible before we start our new flock this spring. I somewhat understand both arguments. I understand separation. I'm looking to keep my chickens self sustaining. If all I want is to purchase a good quality starter flock and continue to propagate from there, why can't I? If I am going to keep a flock it will be strong birds that perform the way that I wish. Why would they not continue to hold to breed and perform even with communal/flock breeding?

 

[Fred's Hens]

I sight every 2 x4 as I choose them out of lumber pile too. My crop rows are laser straight too. Shoot, I like straight lines when I mow the grass.

Well, good buddy, I carefully select which ears of corn, and from which row for my seed. I carefully leave a half dozen choice tomatoes to vine ripen so I can squish the seed from them and only them.. Very particular, I am.

I save back the seed from only my finest hard winter squash and those seed only. We're real selective about where we get a straw of semen for our dairy cow and we're mulling over who's boar will use on the boy's prized young sow he's got.


I'm just goofy that way. I just call it good farming.

OK, I'm outta here. Done with this. Have a great day everybody.