Hi everyone! I've had a couple of people recommend this forum to me as I am doing a lot of research and learning about homesteading in general since my fiance and I are going to be homesteading in about 8.5 mos from now. We will be raising chickens on our homestead, so I'm trying to learn as much as I can before we move!
We plan on moving to Alaska in March of 2022. We don't know where exactly in Alaska we'll be moving to yet, but we are going to be buying 5-10 acres of undeveloped/wooded/rural land, so we are preparing for very harsh winters. We don't want to go too far North, where it's just insanely cold and dark, but we do want to be about 3-5 hours out from the nearest major city (possibly outside the Fairbanks area?).
I've already read one book about chicken breeds and raising and breeding chickens, have done a little online research into cold-tolerant and confinement-tolerant (since I assume we'll need to confine them to a heated indoor run during very cold days in the winter) breeds, as well as having browsed this site a little while my account was getting approved.
I am 23F and my fiance is 31M. I have owned, bred, and raised budgies (aka parakeets) for several years in the past, but that is the extent of my bird experience. My fiance has never been a fan of birds and has never owned one. So this will be a new experience for him, haha!. The only reason I say he isn't a fan of birds, is just because his grandpa used to have parakeets that he just let fly around the house, and they would poop everywhere and on everything. So fiance has no problem with us keeping chickens since they will live outside of our house and won't be flying over our heads constantly lol.
We both grew up in an upper-middle class suburb outside of DFW. Neither of us can stand it, lol. We go camping quite often when it's not too hot here (aka basically can only go camping between October through May/sometimes early June) and cannot wait to leave suburbia and capitalism and just go live off the land by ourselves with our animals.
We will also be having at least 1 cat at first (though we plan to get her a male to breed her to help keep rodents away), as well as 2 puppies. Not too much later we will also be getting 2-4 goats.
So, since we are moving to Alaska, I have been researching cold-tolerant and confinement-tolerant breeds for laying, table, and a little bit of breeding to keep up our stock as well as to make a little extra money on the side by selling eggs/chicks/maybe the occasional chicken. We plan on having somewhere around 6 hens and probably 1 cock for breeding. We may get the cock later on though.
Here are the breeds I've been considering so far:
Layers:
Easter Eggers
Dual:
Orpington
Plymouth Rock aka Barred Rock
Dominique
Delaware
Layers/Dual:
Rhode Island or Rhode Island Red
Australorp
Table/Dual:
Sussex
Are these good breeds to be considering for laying and table purposes in Alaska? Are any of these better than the others? Any suggestions or recommendations are highly appreciated!
Like I said, all I've done so far is browse this forum a bit and read 1 book so far, so any advice on where to proceed next on learning more about keeping and raising chickens would be highly appreciated as well!!
We plan on moving to Alaska in March of 2022. We don't know where exactly in Alaska we'll be moving to yet, but we are going to be buying 5-10 acres of undeveloped/wooded/rural land, so we are preparing for very harsh winters. We don't want to go too far North, where it's just insanely cold and dark, but we do want to be about 3-5 hours out from the nearest major city (possibly outside the Fairbanks area?).
I've already read one book about chicken breeds and raising and breeding chickens, have done a little online research into cold-tolerant and confinement-tolerant (since I assume we'll need to confine them to a heated indoor run during very cold days in the winter) breeds, as well as having browsed this site a little while my account was getting approved.
I am 23F and my fiance is 31M. I have owned, bred, and raised budgies (aka parakeets) for several years in the past, but that is the extent of my bird experience. My fiance has never been a fan of birds and has never owned one. So this will be a new experience for him, haha!. The only reason I say he isn't a fan of birds, is just because his grandpa used to have parakeets that he just let fly around the house, and they would poop everywhere and on everything. So fiance has no problem with us keeping chickens since they will live outside of our house and won't be flying over our heads constantly lol.
We both grew up in an upper-middle class suburb outside of DFW. Neither of us can stand it, lol. We go camping quite often when it's not too hot here (aka basically can only go camping between October through May/sometimes early June) and cannot wait to leave suburbia and capitalism and just go live off the land by ourselves with our animals.
We will also be having at least 1 cat at first (though we plan to get her a male to breed her to help keep rodents away), as well as 2 puppies. Not too much later we will also be getting 2-4 goats.
So, since we are moving to Alaska, I have been researching cold-tolerant and confinement-tolerant breeds for laying, table, and a little bit of breeding to keep up our stock as well as to make a little extra money on the side by selling eggs/chicks/maybe the occasional chicken. We plan on having somewhere around 6 hens and probably 1 cock for breeding. We may get the cock later on though.
Here are the breeds I've been considering so far:
Layers:
Easter Eggers
Dual:
Orpington
Plymouth Rock aka Barred Rock
Dominique
Delaware
Layers/Dual:
Rhode Island or Rhode Island Red
Australorp
Table/Dual:
Sussex
Are these good breeds to be considering for laying and table purposes in Alaska? Are any of these better than the others? Any suggestions or recommendations are highly appreciated!
Like I said, all I've done so far is browse this forum a bit and read 1 book so far, so any advice on where to proceed next on learning more about keeping and raising chickens would be highly appreciated as well!!
Hello and welcome to BYC, You found an Amazing Poultry Community to be a part of with many great knowledgeable members, who are more then willing to jump in and help you along your journey with any questions you may have. 
Glad you joined.
