Post your opinion

[six_eclectic_chickens]

Post your opinion! Purebred or mixed! I want to know your opinions on this topic; whether the best chickens are purebred recognized breeds or mixed breeds aka mutts. In our flock the friendliest chicken right now is a silkie crossed probably with multiple breeds. She gives us tons of eggs and is very curious about everything. My avatar right now is a pic of her. In contrast our barred rock, columbian wyandotte and ameraucana hens don't like being pet as much and prefer to be left alone most of the time. Before she died, Pearl, our auraucana hen was a very laid back calm bird that would hapily sit on your hand. Blackey our OEGB will answer when called with her shrill sound, even come running sometimes. I'd like to hear what you think!

 

[NYREDS]

There's no right answer to this question. What's best is whatever meets your needs best. Mutts would be of no use to me at all.

 

[Silkie Chick]

We love all our birds, but I prefer the rare/unusual ones. Our first set of mixes just hatched about a week ago, so I don't really know their personalities yet. Glad to hear that your mixes came out fine, and that silkie mix avatar of yours is absolutely adorable, I hope ours come out as good as yours.

 

[Ducks and Banny hens]

I have to agree with NYREDS. Mutts suit some, purebreds suit others. Me? I like the non-recognised...

 

[Ra_]

Sometimes people, who may have vested interests, object to any variation from what they themselves are doing under the guise that such people are harming the breed but there are many, many millions of mongrel dogs in the U.S. and I don't think it has hurt anyone who wishes to raise Collies or Chihuahuas or anything else.

If fact, without such work, we wouldn't have the great multitude of breeds of dogs that we have now. Everyone would be breeding wolves and culling anything unusual that popped up.

 

[Oregon Blues]

Mutts are just fine, if they do what you want. I don't have any objection to mutt chickens at all, like I do to mutt dogs. Mutt chickens that aren't wanted get eaten for dinner. They don't end up in the county pound at the taxpayer's expense.

Some of the mutts are exceptionally pretty. If you like their looks and they lay enough eggs to make you happy, then they are doing their job and you can not ask for more than that.

Personally, I like purebreds. I like the consistency. I like knowing what I will get when I hatch. I like showing, and I can not show if I've got mutts. With purebreds I can have breeding goals for looks, temperament, health, laying, broodiness. I can at least have a general idea of what genes I am working with, instead of a bunch of wild cards.

I picked my birds because I like their looks and I can get more that look just like them, over and over, for decades, if I want to. If someone else likes the looks of one of my birds, I can sell them hatchlings that are going to look the same. I know what size, what color, and pretty close to what temperament each hatchling will have.

 

[Ducks and Banny hens]

Personally, I like purebreds. I like the consistency. I like knowing what I will get when I hatch. .

Actuall,y that is the exact reason that I like Seramas, Icelandics, etc.: You have no idea what's coming to you, and it's usually very pretty!

 

[six_eclectic_chickens]

Alright... my opinion is that it doesn't matter what you have. Since we aren't into chickens for show, egg production, or meat it doesn't matter to us. We have a flock of 5 (one died recently if you are looking at my username and wondering) chickens and not one is the same breed. We have a silkie cross, oegb, purebred ameraucana, columbian wyandotte, and a barred rock. Their personalities are all unique and of course they all look different. When we have company and they see Skittles (silkie cross) with her funny featherdo (?) they are suprised that chickens aren't all white or brown. Same response to blue eggs. Our columbian wyandotte, Lacy convinced the neighbour's cats that chickens are not a food source. We are planning to get another chicken or two at the local chicken swap , and have a few purebred chicken breeds picked out however I am sure that we will end up with at least one mutt. Our chickens are really just pets with the added benefit of giving us eggs.

 

[Illia]

My current flock consists of about 75% mutts technically, and the rest are purebreds.


That being said most of the time I prefer purebreds but honestly the question is one I rarely think of. To me, I'm one to follow up with more questions like, what quality are the purebreds? What are the parents of the mutts? What were they bred for?

I'm mainly into chickens for pets, eggs, and meat (but if they're purebred I prefer they conform to the standard) but still they're great pets, however, I like my birds to have some use to me personally. Are they pretty to me, are they LF or Bantam, do they have pinched tails (irks me!) are they bred solely for production, are they aggressive or flighty, . . .


So, technically it doesn't matter to me.

 

[Gresh]

I really prefer breeds and landraces over random mutts. Breeds, in particular, are usually recognized by poultry associations and breed true, meaning they pass along the same body type and related characteristics. They are genetically unique to any other chicken and are usually time-honored (i.e. they were raised decades, centuries, or even millenia ago). Landraces lean more to the mutt side but are unique in that they are time-honored to the extent that they have become unique from other chickens (Icelandics, Swedish Flower Hens, and maybe even Easter Eggers are examples). I do not like random mutts because they scramble chicken genetics and swallow up unique traits that Breeds and Landraces have. Without specific guidelines for poultry breeding, unique traits found in breeds or landraces would be lost.

Just my opinion

~Gresh~