Someone has "all their ducks in a row"I also wanted Legbars because of the egg color until I learned they were temperamentally more like the brown Leghorns I once had (spaz birds that would literally fly the coop when you opened the door, would go on the roof and not come down, etc). My "near Ameraucanas" were bad enough. Now I just want some easy to raise birds that can get along with birds of other colors and sizes and make nice egg baskets. They also have to be cold hardy, and a slight tendency to broodiness might not be a bad thing. But they have to be smart enough to get out of the way of a lawn tractor and even escape some of the lesser predators. There are few quality poultry breeders in the area, but a lot of breeders who buy/sell or breed low quality hatchery specimens of popular breeds. I won't try to compete with that. And there are a lot of sellers of cheap eggs, the Amish undersell everyone. So I will be out of the egg business.
If we move to the new place the birds will have room to roam. We will be looking at three properties tomorrow, all riverfront custom homes on 5-20 acres. Even with more land, I will have a smaller flock, I just want it to be self-sustaining and being able to grow my own broilers would be a plus. The coop will be a place to lay and roost and provide shelter in inclement weather. I'll have a brooder house and grow out pens for my turkeys.
And yeah, if someone figures out ship-a-thin, I'll take two, please.