Just started letting my flock breed on their own

[dhahn70]

This spring I went on a 2 day vacation. When I came back, rather than collect eggs, I put all the eggs under two broody hens. The 24 hens in the flock are red stars and the rooster is buff polish. Out of 24 eggs the hens kept under them, 18 hatched. The remaining eggs still had fully formed chicks that failed to hatch. During incubation, the hens rejected about 6 eggs. From what I've read, this seems to be a pretty good fertility rate. The new chicks were hatched on mothers day. A week ago I found another hen in the chicken yard that has another clutch under her. I like the look of the halfbreeds so I'm going to let her see it through. So here is my plan: once the new chicks are of egg laying age, I would need to replace the rooster to prevent inbreeding. How difficult will it be to introduce a new adult rooster to the flock? I've had a flock turn on and kill a rooster before so I would hate to see that happen. Also, from what I've written, can anyone see any problems or issues with my plans? I'm hoping to be able to have a self replenishing flock and only needing to change out the rooster every year. Any and all input would be welcomed.

 

[HEChicken]

Are you planning on keeping all of those chicks? In that case, I see an issue with winding up with too many hens for one rooster to cover.

 

[dhahn70]

I'm planning on slaughtering the males for meat. Haven't really decided yet about the females. Last fall I placed an ad on Craigslist to sell egg laying hens and got very good response. Easily sold a dozen in just a couple days, 4 at a time, so that's an option. I have 24 hens and 1 rooster now and based on the number of chicks the first time, it seems he is mating successfully with most if not all. We want to start raising our own meat so many of the future chicks are destined for that. If there are too many hens, what happens? Does the fertility rate just go down or will the rooster end up 'exhausting' himself?

 

[HEChicken]

If there are too many hens then yes, fertility will go down. Roosters sometimes develop favorites and those hens will be mated often and others not at all. The recommended ratio is 1:10, so for every 10 hens you add, you might consider keeping a cockerel to raise up. You can have multiple roos in a flock, particularly if they are raised together.