Shadrach's Ex Battery and Rescued chickens thread.

[Solanacae]

I have theories as to why the breeds and related stick together but in the short term what is important is to get people to realise that this is how chickens are.
If and once people accept this then perhaps they might take some care in choosing what breeds they keep and in what circumstances rather than go about choosing like a kid in a sweet shop.

So are you saying that it would be better for the chickens if a flock was all the same breed?

I’m guilty of picking and choosing a wide variety of feather patterns and egg colors. The reason I did that was so I could track who was laying and how often to keep better tabs on their health.

The two chicks I have are ISA Browns - though they were supposedly Buff Orps when I bought them - that I never would have bought except I had a single Brahma chick that needed company, and those two were the youngest I could find. The Brahma chick ended up dying - abandoned by mama hen because it was a week-ish younger than the ISA’s and couldn’t keep up with them, so I can only guess that mama decided to put her energy into the more active chicks. I noticed that she was less attentive to the Brahma one afternoon, decided I needed to keep an eye on the behavior, came back that night from a performance I was in, and the little Brahma was dead from exposure outside the coop. After that, I wasn’t even sure I wanted to keep the two ISA’s (still on the fence about them actually) but I feel a certain responsibility to give them the best life I can since they are here.

If I had known they were production birds, I don’t think I would have bought them. It was my first time hatching eggs and I didn’t know how good a mom my broody would be, or how long she would stick with her chicks. The chicks are 9-ish weeks old now, and she’s still with them. I still wonder if I made the right choice.

 

[pennyJo1960]

Sitting here with my coffee Better half opened the coops.
We did move my hatch of 9 to the little coop. I get photos in bit for tax

 

[Shadrach]

Deliberately limiting the gene pool is not a good idea to my mind.

A lot would depend on how large the gene pool is. This is the point I was trying to make about the jungle fowl and how much impact say another breed of jungle fowl had. The studies you kindly dug up concentrated on the impact the jungle fowl had on domestic breeds over the centuries but there is no reliable data on the reverse.
Given each type of jungle fowl inhabit a relatively small area and have been around for thousands of years I would be interested in knowing approximately what sizes of populations there are and whether inbreeding has had an impact.

Deliberately limiting breeding oportunities within a gene pool and not letting natural selection determine the genes that go forward I agree is a bad idea. It's why domesticated chickens are such a mess.

When the gene pool is small, as I mentioned with the tribes in Catalonia, there comes a point when introducing new genes becomes sensible. I've been told that after seven generations has been found to be the point where new genes are a good idea.

With the tribes natural selection was what determined which genes went forward to a much greater extent than with most keeping arrangements.
In say another twenty years I might have had some idea what factors influenced the survival of a set of genes above another.
In fifty years I would have something to work with.

 

[pennyJo1960]

So in 5 years dump Smudge he will make 7 then.

 

[Shadrach]

I'm guilty of that too. But I'm not terribly worried about it because there's so much enrichment in the hen's environment I'm pretty sure they're contented and living a good life.

Most people are not terribly worried about it either. Most backyard chicken keepers mixed breed groups will coexist quite happily much the same as other species.
The issue with breeds prefering one group over another really only becomes apparent when a) they have the space to seperate b) there are enough of them to make any seperation apparent c) there are enough of each differing breed for each to form a group.

 

[Shadrach]

Yes, your right! Good to know your paying attention! I believe I may owe back taxes as well! just trying the find the best pic!
not sure if you remember your advice to me awhile ago regarding “One eyed Willy”, he is doing great, and has figured out a way to stay in the coop each night with the other alpha/beta roosters. Sneaky little guy gets inside early and roosts amongst the hens, and somehow manages to blend in. I will have to take a few more pics to pay the full amount!

I don't remember. I hope whatever advice I gave turned out to be good advice.
I do remember you though.
Great picture.

 

[Shadrach]

I moved them out.

I could not get the new birds and ISA Browns to integrate.

I needed the space for everybody and they were laying sporadically.

It was hard to let a couple of them go as they were from my first eight chickens that I started with.

The young girl that took them was very happy with them.

What other breeds do you have?

 

[Shadrach]

So are you saying that it would be better for the chickens if a flock was all the same breed?

I’m guilty of picking and choosing a wide variety of feather patterns and egg colors. The reason I did that was so I could track who was laying and how often to keep better tabs on their health.

The two chicks I have are ISA Browns - though they were supposedly Buff Orps when I bought them - that I never would have bought except I had a single Brahma chick that needed company, and those two were the youngest I could find. The Brahma chick ended up dying - abandoned by mama hen because it was a week-ish younger than the ISA’s and couldn’t keep up with them, so I can only guess that mama decided to put her energy into the more active chicks. I noticed that she was less attentive to the Brahma one afternoon, decided I needed to keep an eye on the behavior, came back that night from a performance I was in, and the little Brahma was dead from exposure outside the coop. After that, I wasn’t even sure I wanted to keep the two ISA’s (still on the fence about them actually) but I feel a certain responsibility to give them the best life I can since they are here.

If I had known they were production birds, I don’t think I would have bought them. It was my first time hatching eggs and I didn’t know how good a mom my broody would be, or how long she would stick with her chicks. The chicks are 9-ish weeks old now, and she’s still with them. I still wonder if I made the right choice.

No, not really. There are so many variables.
However, often inter flock problems are from mixing breeds. Mixing crested breeds with normal can cause problems. There are too many combinations that may cause problems to go through here.
My uncle didn't mix his free range chickens.
Most of the people I knew in Catalonia didn't mix breeds and if they did they were quite careful about which breeds they mixed.
Large free range flock keepers tend not to mix breeds.
Most of the serious breeders I've know don't mix breeds.
In the other countries I've been to or know something about their chicken keeping arrangements breed mixing isn't common.
One reason is of course that the vast variety of breeds isn't availible to them.
For most there is no breeder to hatchery, hatchery to local store chain set up to cater for the backyard chicken keeping movement and none that I've spoken to would even consider buying a chicken from a hatchery.
Most chickens are bought from farms/smallholders/specialist breeders unless of course you are in the business of themass production of meat and eggs.
Why would you buy chicken of unkown provenance from some far of place of a type that may not be the right type of chicken to thrive in the environment one wishes to keep it in. It's a recipe for a disaster.

 

[JacinLarkwell]

My Spitzhauben girls are always together (with my mixed flock master too). They're the most different though lookswise so they're easy to notice. My oldest two girls are halfsisters and they tend to hand out with the flock master on and off, though one will leave to nanny chicks and help any broody hens with chicks

 

[MaryJanet]

Most people are not terribly worried about it either. Most backyard chicken keepers mixed breed groups will coexist quite happily much the same as other species.
The issue with breeds prefering one group over another really only becomes apparent when a) they have the space to seperate b) there are enough of them to make any seperation apparent c) there are enough of each differing breed for each to form a group.

Yes.

And the other factors I'm bound to acknowledge are my very limited experience in chicken keeping and my concern that I wouldn't know if a hen was having trouble laying, which drove my preference for different coloured eggs and my focus on Australorp and Barnevelder.

Once I trusted myself on who lays what and when, colour didn't matter any more (it was a complete fluke that Peggy lays blue).