Hello from SC

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crunchygeek

crunchygeek

Hatching
5 Years
Dec 22, 2014
4
0
7
Hey, Everybody!!

I am Charlie from South Carolina. We moved to a new home near Charleston with 12 and a half acres near the end of summer. I am married to Amy, and we have six kids. We homeschool them, always have.

Getting chickens to have our own eggs has been pretty high on the priority list ever since we started looking for land a couple of years ago. I did have a beehive, but my older son developed an allergy to the stings, so they had to go bye-bye.

My biggest question at this point is how many chickens do I need? Goal is for the chickens to provide eggs for our use. We normally use 2-3 doz a week. We have been buying from other individuals around us who have many more chickens and raise them to sell the eggs.

From the scant bit of reading I have done so far, the laying rate depends on the breed. Our climate is hot and humid.

I am particularly interested in the composting article in the Learning Center.

I heard about BYC from a friend of mine who lives in a subdivision with 4 chickens he got last spring.
 
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Glad you decided to join us.

I don't know the exact answer to your question. The number of eggs each lays depends on age, molts, broodiness.

I would suggest you take a look at the breeds you are interested in. Most of the hatchery sites offer free info including number of eggs per year for each breed.

I also found this site with chicken calculators to help decide which and how many:

http://www.chickenwaterer.com/Default.asp

Good luck on your venture.
 
Thank you, sunflour! I will look at that site.

What kinds of chickens do you have? Macon is not that far away from Charleston.
 
Hello there and welcome to BYC!
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I keep Black Australorps and Barred Rocks. Excellent layers even into older age. You can expect 5 to 7 eggs a week out of these two breeds per bird. Of course as they age the egg laying does decline. However my Aussies are nearly 4 years old and are still pumping out those eggs. So a flock of 6 birds of these breeds will give you a couple or so dozen eggs a week.

Good luck with what ever breed you choose and welcome to our flock!
 
Welcome to BYC, Charlie. I'm glad you decided to join our flock. I egg priority is a priority, I would suggest Black Sex Links (Black Stars), which are often used by laying houses for brown eggs (for good reason), and are hardy and friendly egg laying machines. I've raised them for years (along with dozens of other breeds) and they have been my best layers, consistently churning out more than 300 eggs per hen per year. If you prefer a standard breed as BSLs are hybrids, I would second TwoCrows' suggest of Black Australorps. They are extremely hardy, calm and gentle (my children, and now my granddaughter, made lap pets of them), and the best layers of the standard, brown egg laying breeds. Please feel free to ask any questions you may have. We are here to help in any way we can. Good luck in getting your flock.
 

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