A couple of weeks ago a dog killed 2 out of 3 of my pekin hens. However my OEGB cockerel managed to fly onto the roof so he survived . Luckily i had recently moved my broody hen into a large dog crate with her one chick (which is a cockerel) so she also survived. I have also been hand rearing 7 chicks from eggs that the now deceased hens laid. So my flock currently stands at 8 OEGB x pekin chicks. 4 are around 10 weeks old and 3 are around 6 weeks old. And one is under a broody and is 2 weeks old. Of these 8 chicks i have 3 cockerels one 10 weeks old, 1 6 weeks old and 1 2 weeks old. My question is i plan on replacing the OEGB cockerel with one of these young cockerels. My theory being that the half pekin in them plus the fact they were hand reared will mean they will be tamer and therefore less likely to attack people. As currently my OEGB cockerel is fairly aggressive. Is this a good theory? Also i plan on replacing the 2 hens that were killed. Would it be best to replace them with pekin hens to keep the broody hen happy? As the pekin likes to sit and watch the world go by, whereas the OEGB x pekin chicks run around all over the place in a mad food finding frenzy. I am hesitant about replacing the hens with pekins as sources on the internet say 3 eggs a week is what is expected from the avergae hen. However the hens that just died were laying 5 a week. Granted they had only been laying for 6 weeks. Would a hybrid hen get on okay with the bantams? What are your opinions on my replacements? If not pekins any recommendations for another bantam breed. Sorry for the mass of information.
