How to handle pulling small breeding groups out of my flock

[lizrndiver]

I have a flock of 99 hens/pullets and 25 cockerels.

I have separated out 22 of the cockerels into a separate pen to get ready for the freezer.

I want to keep 3 roos for the 99 girls. I want to be able to periodically breed each roo with only the same breed hens to get some purebred hatching eggs.

The rest of the time they will all free range together.

I hear that I need to wait 2 weeks before I start collecting eggs from the breeding group to allow any "old" sperm to clear.

So the small group could be away from the main group for about a month.

Will I have problems putting them back in the flock?

Any advice on the best way to do this?

Any advice on how to manage a flock of this type?

Thanks,

Liz

 

[Azriel]

I'll be watching this as I would like to do this on a smaller scale, I don't have or want anywhere near that many birds, but would work the same.

 

[KaneMoa]

The only way I have ever been able to do such a thing is in large, separated "fly" pens that the roosters stay in and you can swap out hens. Usually 6-10 hens is enough for one rooster to service. I would keep 3 fly pens for your Roos and rotate the hens in groups of 10. If you leave them all together u will get mix breeds.

 

[Oregon Blues]

You need separate pens. Before breeding season, you separate all the birds into the groups that you want and leave them there until after breeding season.

If you have 3 different breeds, I suggest that you build 3 large pens with coops and simply leave the 3 flocks separated all the time.

My birds have a coop and a generous size run for each breed. Then the runs open up into a large "free range" area (securely fenced), and the flocks take turns having access to the large area.