Just starting a "real" hen house.

[PAChickenChick]

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Hmmm...I think somewhere I saw that Americunas (sp?) are the best egg layers, Rhode Island Reds and 2nd, and Barred Plymouth Rocks are 3rd. (I could be wrong...going from memory) Anyway, RIR's & PR's are dual birds..and supposedly good natured. I really hope that is the case cause they are the breeds I chose and for those reasons...hahahaha.

I might have to look up Storey's guide...can you tell me how to locate it?

Thanks

 

[CrustyCurmudgeon]

There ya all go, popin my bubble. Here I was fixin to order the perfect dual purpose bird and ya'll say there ain't one!! LOL
All joking aside, that's why I came here, I want this kind of feed back, helps me research better. IF The Australorp butchers well or even ok, I think I'm headed that way.... Or RIR, a lot of the Amish around the west of here have RIR for layers, would make trading a rooster easier. The aspect of running two operations, one for meat and one for eggs makes keeping birds rather less attractive, turns it into a hassle. I just want to candle and raise a few birds a week for meat. If I have to butcher a hundred birds at a time and freeze them, I might as well keep going to the store. The purpose here is to ELIMINATE THE STORE AND FREEZER. Freezers take electricity, that is a cost that is escalating, uncontrollable by us, and controlled by crooks. I want to get rid of as much need for electricity as possible, notice I said need. We'll still have all the conveniences, just keep cutting back on how we do things with electricity, phase it out. Air conditioning without electricity is a challenge, but I do have a few ideas....

Jeff ><>

 

[Chickenaddict]

I'm not sure if this will help in your decision but i have cochin bantams but i know they have standard size cochins. To me they are the sweetest chicken i have ever owned and are excellent layers and mothers. HOwever i have no experience with the standard size cochins but if personalities are anything like the bantams they would make good dual purpose birds that is of course if their meats any good.... anyone out there that eat their standard cochins??



Edited because i haven't had my coffee yet

 

[HeadHen]

Hmmm...I think somewhere I saw that Americunas (sp?) are the best egg layers, Rhode Island Reds and 2nd, and Barred Plymouth Rocks are 3rd. (I could be wrong...going from memory) Anyway, RIR's & PR's are dual birds..and supposedly good natured. I really hope that is the case cause they are the breeds I chose and for those reasons...hahahaha.
I might have to look up Storey's guide...can you tell me how to locate it?
Thanks

Well leghorns are considered the best layers but terrible personality and very skinny. There are hybrids (RIR cross) that are touted as being egg laying machines that can lay an egg a day. It is my understanding that Americana lay a few a week at most. I have a bunch of the hybrids (9 black stars and 9 red stars) about 5 RIR and 2 EE's and a buttercup but they are only a couple weeks old, so we will see.
I've seen a lot of posts from people saying after they went through all the effort of butchering their RIR it didn't really seem to be worth it for how little meat they got.
Maybe not the norm though???

Storey's Guide to Raising Chicken's by Gail Damerow is the book I mentioned. It is kinda considered the authority on chicken raising. I got a copy at the library but going to buy one because there is just too much good information in it that I can tell I will need to keep referencing as my birds grow.
Hope that helps

Maybe get a couple good egg layers and then a trio of good meat hens and meat roo and then a really broody silky to hatch their eggs for them?​

 

[walkswithdog]

My Great Grandmother kept a flock of barred rocks. Good solid, friendly birds, laid well, made a nice sized dressed out carcass. Of course compared to the single purpose birds you aren't going to get a comparison. The massive cockerals that are meat bird crosses and crippled if you let them mature obviously make bigger meat. The rampant egg layers, producing mondo amounts of eggs but can't reproduce and are sketchy.

Yes, a dual purpose bird produces less mondo amounts of meat, and slightly fewer eggs than the single purpose birds. On the happy side, they tend to forage, be healthier, reproduce themselves (key if you want to make more), tolerate differing climates and situations and are usually calmer, friendlier critters.

You want mondo meat from a dual purpose bird, have your excess cockerals caponized. Bingo, big bird.

But any of the big dual birds could work, the plymouth rocks, orpingtons, australorps, wyandottes, langshans, brahmas, cochins and on and on. Giants don't tend to make good meat birds, by the time they mature, they're pretty darn tough. Lay well, forage really well, sweet animals.

It all depends on your preferences as much as anything, feather foots, booteds or clean feet, color, feather type, the possibilities are endless and the ADDICTS on here will get you totally hooked so just settle in and read (and look at lots of pictures) and have fun. You are doomed. Fortunately, there is a lot of company here for you, once you're an inmate of the asylum.

 

[Chickenaddict]

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LOL.... the padded walls in here aren't so bad

Fabulous chicken decor too

 

[rooster0209]

I just started with a bunch of mixed breed eggs from some local farmer friends that have free range chickens. I can see some barred rock in the birds, a leghorn maybe, some buff colored something or another. These guys raise for meat and eggs.

When they asked what I ended up with, they said the black hens lay an egg a day and never fail. I ended up with 8 pretty hens (one very bossy black hen) and two roosters. One is really neat looking and the other is almost solid white...just showing a tad bit of cream color.

My MIL said that bantums were good, but butchering such a small chicken was not worth the hassel. She prefers a larger meat bird. So taking from these experienced chicken ppl, I dont think that "breed" actually is specific necessity, unless you are wanting chickens as an income.