So many different breeds - How did you decide?

[JohnandJacquelineW]

I started this out hoping to get ideas on how we could decide for our flock - but even now that we've ordered, I'm still enjoying hearing how everyone else decided. Everyone's story is a little bit different though many share similarities.

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My wife and I were actually talking about that the other day. We decided before we got married that we didn't want to have cable in our home as we thought it would be an unneeded expense that would also make it easier to just waste our time (not judging anyone that has cable - I have had it before myself - just a personal choice for us). But we were out watching the chickens the other night and she made the comment, "Who needs a TV when you've got chickens!?"


Of the ones we've raised from chicks (we also bought two adult hens to start getting eggs right away) we only have 1 surviving pullet(raccoon got a couple before we had things secured as well as we should have

) who is a barred rock - probably a little over halfway to laying age.

We ordered quite a mix of breeds from Meyer's Hatchery and are now looking forward to getting a shipment toward the end of July.

 

[KDailey]

I had a really hard time deciding as well. It's taken me 4 days to decide (and to get paycheck. lol).

I got my 5 chicks I have now from our neighbor that raises chickens. She just gave me the chicks that had hatched the day before, not concerned really about breed. When she was showing me all her chickens I really liked the silkies and cochins, they were so cute! So I was really hoping that the chicks I got would turn out to have at least 1 silkie and 1 cochin. Turns out I did have 1 black silkie but he died 2 days later.

I really like the look of the silkies and so that's where I got the idea to get more. My neighbor pointed me to this website and I've been pouring over it ever since learning as much as I can. I saw the auction section and got really excited that I could buy more chickens over the internet. After I got to looking though I saw that the majority of people selling were selling hatching eggs, not chicks. Or if they were selling chicks they would prefer pick-ups only and all the ads for silkie chicks were way too far away for me to go get. Then I saw a thread someone had posted about something called Ideal and their chicks they got for $1.00 ea. I just had to find this place.

When I found the site I was ecstatic! Ideal is only about 3 hours away from me so I could pick up or if I chose to ship they should arrive over night. Then I realized just how many wonderful breeds there were! OMG.... I couldn't decide.

I thought I wanted a bunch of cute little bantums and figured I would order 10 of the assorted feather legged bantums. It would include silkies and cochins among others. Then I thought, "what if my assortment doesn't manage to include silkies?" So I thought, "well I'll just add 3 assorted silkies for good measure." Then because the assortment of feather legged bantums included a few breeds that I hadn't looked into I started reading and looking for pictures. Low and behold, Belgium d'Uccles were gorgeous! Fell in love with those. Brahmas are pretty good egg layers, yay!

After thinking a little more rationally I thought it would be best to have some standards that are good egg layers just for good measure. I couldn't decide until I saw that Brahmas come in the standard size as well as the bantum, they are pretty and should be decent egg layers. So Brahmas are my standard egg laying breed. On top of that I could by them specifically as a group of pullets and 1 roo. I wouldn't have to worry about getting all roo's or all hens.

So now because I'll be getting standard brahmas I don't really need more than what I ordered and the feather legged bantum assortment could include more brahmas. So I scratched that assortment and looked at which breeds I just really wanted. I knew I wanted Silkies, I really liked the look of the d'Uccles, and the bantum cochins were just so cute. I was trying to figure out how to order and still get a good number of each with the best possibility of not getting all roos and staying at 15 chicks ordered (I already have 5 at home)

Nothing I tried was very reasonable. So I wound up ordering 4 Standard Brahma pullets, 1 Standard Brahma roo, 5 silkies, 5 d'Uccles and caved and got 5 bantum cochins. So I wound up ordering 20 chicks and will total 25. I'm just glad we haven't actually started the building on the coops and runs so now I can just plan to make everything a little larger. hahahaha

 

[sharol]

Welcome to the wonderful world of chicken math. ;-)

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[KDailey]

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I'm learning very quickly that 1 chicken + 1 chicken does not equal 2 chickens. It equals 20 something plus. lol

 

[vanilla.exe]

Fluffy. That's how I decided

 

[Nicole01]

Luckily the farm store had a huge variety of chicks. I picked mostly one of each breed I really wanted. I got really lucky and ended up with all girls. I had a few I picked out of the straight run bin. I'm very happy with my choices. Next time around, I'll try a new breed or two.

 

[gryeyes]

My first, flip answer to the subject line question was gonna be: Gimme one of those, and one of those, and one of that breed, and one of those over there, and how about one of THOSE while you're at it!

But I really did pick my first 8 by referring to Henderson's Handy Dandy Chicken Chart.

I wanted dual purpose birds, because those bred as layers only are kinda scrawny. I like big, fluffy-butt hens. No intention of ever eating any... Out of the dual purpose breeds, I looked for good temperaments and "tolerates confinement well" - although that doesn't matter so much now, as my flock ranges freely nowadays.

Next determining factor was color. A little bit of this, a little bit of that.... "Mambo Number Five" kinda selection process.

And then there were bantam breeds - midget chickens! Adorable! I added bantam breeds by the end of my first year keeping chickens. Then ducks.... And now geese....at least I am staying with only two breeds of ducks and one of geese, chosen for how they look, their temperament and the amount of noise they produce.

 

[TK Poultry]

I went through umm probably ten breeds before I landed on Ameraucanas. I'm terribly indesicive and so I just went and I bought a trio of things that seemed interesting to me. With in a month or so (if they are adults) you will know whether you like them or not. I think I've had
New Hampshires (hatchery)
Barred Rocks (hatchery)
White Rocks (hatchery, but I did like them)
EEs, Swedish Ducks (I LOVED them and if I had the room I'd have them again!)
Buff Ducks
Muscovy Ducks
Silkies
Cochins (bantam and standard)
Seramas
Sebrights
d'Uccles
Japanese
Bantam Rhode Island Reds

It takes a while to decide on what you like. I now have bantam Ameraucanas in 4 different colors (getting my 5th and 6th this fall) and I'm working on getting Large Fowl Ameraucanas. I just love the breed. I'm not sure completely why but I love them all the same. My mom currently has Butterscotch Call ducks and my sister Mallard ducks. just get what visually appeals to you and then weed out what you don't think quite makes the cut. There are still breeds that I want to just try like Faverolles, Orpingtons, Turkeys, and Guineas. My advise is just to experiement.

 

[kesali]

I had very little experience, but wanted chickens that would be fairly docile so as not to take off somewhere, good layers, and winter-hardy. After searching BYC and going to the various hatcheries on the internet, I decided on barred rocks, SLW's, and partridge rocks. They are 7-weeks old now and I am very satisfied with them so far.

 

[NYRIR]

I looked at all the chicken breeds and ordered at least 2 of every kind I wanted...lol...and now my coop is FULL! So that is the ONLY thing that stops me from getting 2 of even more breeds...I have over 20 different breeds in chickens alone