Some things to ponder... this is our 3rd season for going dual purpose/sustainable. Start with large stock Breeder-bred birds, they'll be larger in almost all varieties. You may need to keep additional hens in order to get larger batches of chicks at a time. 5 hens will get you about 35 eggs (though not all may be hatching quality) in a batch if you collect over 8 days, up to 10 days or more is possible for storage, the standard rule is 7 days for collection. When making breeding picks, expect to select from 30% of the hatch, not all will be breeding quality for their variety. Half of the hatch will be boys, on average. I just sorted 22 boys out of 31... At least we'll eat good?
Grow out space for each age group... every batch that's farther away than 3 weeks in age will need their own space until they're competitive in size to the prior batch. If you do small batches often, you'll find yourself with many ages that may need separate housing, to avoid the older ones picking on the newer ones.
Heritage birds won't be ready for processing until at least 20 weeks, some varieties don't have fast growth and need 8 months to get anywhere close to their advertised mature weight. Feed has some influence on this as well but they can only grow as big/fast as they're genetically programed to do.
If we eat chicken regularly we can go through 3 a week for just us 2 but 75/yr is plenty. That means 150+ need to be hatched a year. (we only invite the boys to dinner) Spring/Summer/Fall offers the best forage, to take advantage of that you wouldn't want to hatch any later than June. For us, the sale of extra pullets pays for the feed for the boys, in case there is a batch that needs fed over winter from a late summer or fall hatch. We started using pasture tractors last year and that's been awesome.
I watch the growth on the boys to see who sprouted first, who filled out first versus who shot up in height like a beanpole. Then I watch their initial hormone bloom... overly aggressive birds come to dinner first. Largest that aren't potential breeders go after that. At 20 weeks I put legbands on my breeder picks so that husband doesn't do the wrong ones.
Here is an example of different body types... the first is a Blue Birchen Marans at 6 months old...
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Next is his half brother split to Silverrud for an Olive egger, same age at 6 months old. He's lighter built, not as wide/deep in structure...
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This next guy is bigger than the Marans, from a line of Hybrids I've had since our first year here. His sons in the bachelor pen now at 8 weeks old stand out in size!
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With the dual purpose varieties, you're looking for a depth and width to the body, broad across the back, coincidentally what the SOP calls for that fills out a baking pan better than an efficient layer breed would. When making selections, you have to put your hands on them and feel, the feathers can hide a lot.
For the girl's, in my hybrid pen I'm looking for the big Bertha types. Here in a couple of years my feed bill is going to reflect how big they were bred! I have a new cockerel in mind for next year, based on how he matures.
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In this picture, the white bird standing behind him is a Bresse. Look at the width between his legs! For dual purpose, the Bresse have been great! The girls have been laying machines and I forgive them for their boring white feathers.
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It helps to have more breeder girls than you need, so that you can be picky/selective on which eggs get set. If you breed too much towards meat traits, you'll lose laying ability. If you breed towards laying ability/frequency, you'll lose table traits. Finding and maintaining that balance is where you get dual purpose.
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