I too am a huge planner, so I completely understand where you're coming from! We are also just getting started with chickens this year, so I can't offer a lot of first-hand experience, but I thought I'd share our plans and what we have done so far.
We ordered 24 Orpington day-old chicks this spring. They were hatched on May 1st. We lost two almost right away, and ended up with 11 pullets and 11 cockerels. We banded all the cockerels with a different colored leg band so we could keep track of them, their personalities, etc. We decided to keep two roos - looking at who was the nicest, as well as who was good for breeding. (Note: we don't know that much about breeding so our standards were probably lower or more superficial than a real breeder; we prioritized personality first, followed by size and then looks. So we ended up with one
very friendly, large, pretty roo and one calm, slightly standoff-ish, large,
very pretty roo.) So far, our cockerels have been great, even though they are now breeding with the hens. The very friendly one comes over to us every time we go outside, looking for treats; the more standoff-ish one comes too but not nearly as close, hanging back until he sees that we do in fact have treats. Neither has shown any signs of aggression towards either myself or my husband... yet. I'm hoping it stays that way.
Since we had never butchered chickens before, I contacted a friend of mine who does 100+ meat chickens every year, and we just brought our extra roos to his farm the day he did his meaties. They were around 4 months old, averaging around 5 lbs dressed. We had one the other night, and it was really good! Firmer but not tough, moist and there was plenty for my husband and I to have leftovers.
Our coop is large enough to house almost 100 birds... 382 sq ft. They have a 12x22.5 enclosed run, but free range most of the time.
As others have said, we plan on building up our flock slowly. The ultimate goal is to be hatching 16 laying hens and close to 52 birds for meat. We also hope our hens, a breed that tends to go broody, will hatch and raise their own.
Next spring, our goal is to hatch 36 chicks (probably more in case some die). Hopefully at least 16 will be pullets. The other 20 we'll butcher in the fall.
In 2018, we'll hatch 48 chicks; 16 pullets we'll keep, 32 we'll butcher.
In 2019, we'll hatch 52; 16 pullets we'll keep, 36 we'll butcher, and the 11 original hens we have right now we'll butcher, for a total of 47 birds in the freezer.
In 2020, we'll hatch 52; 16 pullets we'll keep, 36 we'll butcher, and the 16 chicks from 2017 we'll also butcher, for a total of 52 birds in the freezer. This we'll repeat every year, maybe increasing the number we'll hatch at some point. But 1 bird to eat a week seems like a good goal for us right now.
With this plan, by 2020, we'll always have 3 sets of 16 laying hens, at different ages. The first year hens will start laying some by winter, the second year hens will be laying the most, and the third year hens will be decreasing the amount they lay. Hens tend to decrease laying after they are 3 years old. When butchering older hens, they generally go in a stew pot since they tend to be tough.
We'll have the most birds at any one time during the summer, when they spend all day outside anyway - 102 summer birds. By winter, we'll only have 50 (the 48 laying hens and 2 roos).
We'll see if everything goes according to plan though! You know what they say about counting your eggs
