How to keep chickens cheap?

[Hooligans7]

This is what I did. When I told my customers I was thinking of getting out of the egg business, since they don't lay well during the winter, and feed prices never came down from the increases a while back, they offered to pay $3.

That worked out perfectly! Great that your customers realize and appreciate the quality of your eggs. Well done, azelgin.

 

[Animals970]

Ok, I'll se what I can do. I'm gonna be making a website for my rabbitry when I get going, I'll advertise eggs there. I'll put a sign at the end of my driveway and i'll put some posters up. Would that help?

 

[Ridgerunner]

There are different red sex links you can get from a hatchery. One kind is made by crossing recognized breeds, often but not always a Rhode Island Red rooster with some other breed of hen (maybe Rhode Island White, White Rock, Silver Laced Wyandotte, or Delaware) to get the red sex links. These will normally lay pretty well but they are the larger more inefficient birds, very much like their parents.

The other kind are the commercial hybrid egg layers. These are the smaller more efficient ones at converting feed to eggs since they don’t have that large body to maintain. If your red sex links are close in size to your Orpington (realize your Orpington probably have a lot of fluffy feathers so they may look bigger than they really are) they are made from crossing regular breeds. But if they are a lot smaller (these normally have a fairly large single comb like a leghorn) they are probably based on the commercial birds.

I can’t remember all the marketing names for these. I need Fred for that. Hubbard, ISA Browns, and Bovans are some I recall.

 

[Animals970]

I got mine at tractor supply, and I think they were called either Red Sex Links or Red Stars.

 

[Animals970]

So!!, does anybody else have any suggestions?

 

[Coralietg]

I free range most of the day, feed laying pellets ($14 for 50lbs), sell eggs at $2 a dozen and about break even with the cost of feed. That's pretty cheap to me. I have a very mixed flock, but the Barred Rocks, production red, Leghorns and Easter Eggers lay well. I usually put a mix of blue, olive, green, dark brown, light brown, cream and white eggs into my dozen and people like that.

Excellent suggestions from people!

 

[Animals970]

I free range most of the day, feed laying pellets ($14 for 50lbs), sell eggs at $2 a dozen and about break even with the cost of feed. That's pretty cheap to me. I have a very mixed flock, but the Barred Rocks, production red, Leghorns and Easter Eggers lay well. I usually put a mix of blue, olive, green, dark brown, light brown, cream and white eggs into my dozen and people like that.

Excellent suggestions from people!

How many chickens do you have? Would y'all suggest I cull the birds that aren't laying?

 

[bobbi-j]

How many chickens do you have? Would y'all suggest I cull the birds that aren't laying?

If they're not productive, and you're trying to be as financially efficient as possible, then yes. Right now you're dumping feed into chickens that are giving you nothing in return. Instead, you could buy replacement hens that are laying and get a return for your money, get chicks to replace your hens who won't be laying next year (assuming you'd have some of that age), or cull them and don't replace them and not have to buy feed as often.

 

[Coralietg]

How many chickens do you have? Would y'all suggest I cull the birds that aren't laying?

I have 17 standard layers, plus 8 bantam layers and 3 roosters. Yes, I would definitely cull the none-layers if you want to remain productive.

 

[tangle70]

So, what breeds would you suggest?

A pure layer, I would suggest ISA Browns (that was the name on the label at TSC). I get 6 plus very large eggs a week per chicken. They where very friendly and easy to handle.