Raising for eggs and meat and how to "Manage"

[cgizzy]

I grew up in Southwest Michigan and now my fiance and I are moving back this fall with the intention of buying a house this winter and the first thing I want to do is get some chickens for spring 2013... I've been researching it for over a year and have selected the two breeds I want: faverolles and javas. I want 3 hens and a rooster for each breed, for a total of 8 chickens. I want to raise the chickens for both eggs and meat. I grew up with chickens, as did my fiance... so having chickens for eggs is not new to us and we can do it with our eyes closed; but we've never breed chickens or raised them for meat.

My ideal goal would be to be able to have both fresh meat and fresh eggs all year round... essentially culling the flock year round.

While I've been researching how to have chickens for a while, I'm having difficulty figuring out breeding them. I'll be keeping the two breeds separate.. dont want any accidental Javerolles

So my questions are:

1) What is the best way to do this without having to cull the flock all at once.
2) Is the best way to have small batches of chicks throughout the year?
3) Do I just cull the newly matured chicks? Obviously I would kill the roosters, but what of the hens?
4) This seems like an odd question, and I'm a bit embarrassed to ask; but, if I don't cull the newly matured hens for various reasons, Do I need to put them in a separate pen, away from Daddy.. or can I keep my hens together. I would ideally like to keep my hens together... or is this something I really don't need to worry about.
5) do I even have enough hens, or is this even possible?

If you have any advice will be greatly appreciated... Next spring seems like a good distance away, but I'm a planner and I want to have things figured out well before I get the chickens.

 

[Judy]

A hen lays fertile eggs from the rooster she is with for about 3 to 4 weeks after they are separated, so if you want purebred chicks, you only need to keep the "wrong" rooster separate for 4 weeks before collecting eggs to hatch purebred chicks. There's really no reason to ever separate the hens from each other. You could have two breeding pens where you can put the roo with your best hens of the same breed for a couple of months, and hatch eggs after a month in the breeding pen, in order to hatch purebred chicks. The whole flock could be in one space while you are collecting eggs to eat, or even to hatch chicks to eat, if you don't care if they are purebred.