My current breeding project birds

[Germaine_11.20]

Dancing Bear, I still want hatching eggs from you and I would love some from that beefy DC Roo! Please let me know when you are ready to sell.

My girls are nice and chunky but the roo.... sad, just sad.

 

[dancingbear]

Rustyswoman, I'm about to set a new batch of eggs to hatch, I want to make sure I don't have anything weird going on, since my pal got such a poor hatch. I also have the 2 buckeye roos I have to get rid of, and about a month after they're gone, we can figure the eggs will mostly be fertile from the Cornish roo. I need to reduce the number of hens a little, too, I've got too many for one roo. The fertility was only running about 75-85% before the buckeyes got old enough to get in on the act. That's not too shabby for 1 roo over about 47 hens, but still, that's too many hens.

So I'm doing this test run, the chicks are spoken for, then I'll do another batch after the BE's are gone. If they hatch ok, I can sell some eggs for hatching. It's too bad you're not closer!

 

[Germaine_11.20]

Thanks! I may not be close but I am patient!!!

 

[KatyTheChickenLady]

Quote:
really, you get 85% fertility with one roo over 47 hens????!!! that's amazing, I had no idea! I 've been keeping one roo per six hens with 100% fertility; do you think I could maintain the 100% with 12 hens per roo?

 

[Red&Yellow]

KatyChickenLady, I have a roo with 17 hens and 100% fertility. Just depends on how much he likes to love.

 

[dancingbear]

Quote:
really, you get 85% fertility with one roo over 47 hens????!!! that's amazing, I had no idea! I 've been keeping one roo per six hens with 100% fertility; do you think I could maintain the 100% with 12 hens per roo?

I've had 100% fertility with one roo and up to 25-30 hens. Hens getting mated on a regular basis will continue to lay fertile eggs for at least 3 weeks after the rooster is removed, and I've had eggs hatch that were collected about 5 weeks after a rooster was gone. I'd had a roo taken by a fox, and I'd read the hens stayed fertile a long time, so I tried it, and it worked. I don't remember how many hatched out of how many eggs, it was about 8 years or so ago. It wasn't 100% at that point, but it was a fair number. So if the roo is getting around to all of them, there's no reason you shouldn't have 100% fertility with 1 roo over 20, so 12 would certainly be no problem. I think the only reason I had some not fertile, is he just hadn't gotten around to all of them.

 

[Germaine_11.20]

That is amazing! I bet it keeps the girls backs from getting bare with all the hens to share the love.

 

[dancingbear]

You'd think so, but he still has his favorites, and they still have the bare backs, and sparse head feathers. I guess those raggedly looking hens are just the sexiest girls in the flock.