Flock Management Questions

[uncle]

I need a little advice.
I have 25 Dom Pullets and 3 Dom Roos that are 11 weeks old. I have one girl that I will have to cull as she has a slightly bad foot. Other than this, I want to get my flock supporting their existence.
I have an incubator, brooders and such.
I was thinking something like incubate and hatch a batch, brood them while hatching another batch and continue this until they get about 20 weeks old. Butcher the 20 week olds every 21 days or so.
This should give me 30-40 chickens a month, which is more than I need so I could sale the balance or something.
When do you cycle out your breed stock?
Would you spread out the incubator setting to 5-6 weeks?
I just want to always have fresh chicken and not pay the prices at the store ever again.
Brian

 

[BairleaFarm]

I have a line. Incubate, hatch, 2 days in the house, outside in a pen til they have wing feathers, moved to another pen until fully feathered, then out to the coop sometimes at 3 weeks old.

When my layers get about 2 years old they will be sold. I keep a few chicks from every hatch to maintain my flock.

 

[sunket77]

There is a meat bird thread on the forum, you might get some more answers there

 

[Amethyste]

FYI at 20 weeks there won't be much meat on the DP birds.

 

[mulewagon]

I'm doing something similar, with a small meat-and-eggs flock, except that I'm letting the hens brood and raise their young. We just have one large pen, and I've had bad experiences with the older hens attacking younger ones.

I have one corner of the big pen fenced off with a shelter for the broody. If a girl goes broody in the nestboxes, I give her wooden eggs and let her wait until the broody pen comes free. Then each mama raises her own little flock among the others.

(Due to snake losses, I also put the youngest batch and mama in a snake-proof cage each night. By 2-3 weeks, they can follow mama up onto the roost.)

 

[Kountreefok]

Sorry, not much help with your timing question but can share what we do.
Breeding season (for us)--spring thru early (to mid

) summer the incubators are busy and the sections of the brooder room are cycling. With fresh roosters every breeding season to prevent inbreeding.
Good luck with finding the system that works for you!