Starting a purebred flock

[SnackMeat]

Lol, my bad. I feel like I responded to a different generic breed thread question that wasn't specific to endangered ones. Went back and read your original post and you already are specifically looking to those

 

[RollinWithTheStones]

I've had bantams in the past and they are spunky and adorable. I was looking at their site when I posted. We're still in the planning phase so we'll see what comes our way for sure. Thanks for the info.

 

[SnackMeat]

Sure. I looked more closely at the list, and while Hamburgs aren't everyone's cup of tea, our favorite flock member from the last few months has been a gold spangled Hamburg. Maybe we just hit the lotto, but she was the opposite of the flighty, wild creature we were expecting. She may not have been effusive in affection but she always would stand still while we picked her up. Her male counterpart was more skittish, but his love is bought with American cheese such that the next day after first introducing the flock to cheese he was landing on me asking where his cheese was.

She is quite talkative now, in a low gravelly way. It's odd because she seems so insistent even though we don't understand. We'll hand feed her the best food and still it sounds like she's giving us a good talking to. About what? No idea. But she flies to my shoulder often now, or approaches all the time. Her body type looks more like a bantam pheasant. The male is pretty interesting because of his tail, but the female is very pretty.

The Barred Hollands are more like friendly partiers. Always up for a good time, but if you're not doing much, off they roll to the next good time. But it could just be my crew which were mainly cockerels. I might have one pullet but it's hard to tell.

 

[RollinWithTheStones]

Sure. I looked more closely at the list, and while Hamburgs aren't everyone's cup of tea, our favorite flock member from the last few months has been a gold spangled Hamburg. Maybe we just hit the lotto, but she was the opposite of the flighty, wild creature we were expecting. She may not have been effusive in affection but she always would stand still while we picked her up. Her male counterpart was more skittish, but his love is bought with American cheese such that the next day after first introducing the flock to cheese he was landing on me asking where his cheese was.

She is quite talkative now, in a low gravelly way. It's odd because she seems so insistent even though we don't understand. We'll hand feed her the best food and still it sounds like she's giving us a good talking to. About what? No idea. But she flies to my shoulder often now, or approaches all the time. Her body type looks more like a bantam pheasant. The male is pretty interesting because of his tail, but the female is very pretty.

The Barred Hollands are more like friendly partiers. Always up for a good time, but if you're not doing much, off they roll to the next good time. But it could just be my crew which were mainly cockerels. I might have one pullet but it's hard to tell.

Gorgeous. My last go round over 12 years ago I had a mixed bag. Most of them came from left over 4-H projects so I have no clue what I had. I did love my mixed breed girls. I'm still trying to figure out what I want to do, aside from buy all the birds LOL.

 

[SnackMeat]

Yeah, it is hard. I started in the spring, so you have to factor in seasonal stuff. For example, supposedly chicks born outside of spring aren't as hardy, but I think there's probably a curve time-wise, where after they get past a certain point they're just as hardy.

Looking at the list again, we do have a mottled java hen who looks like a stout teapot. It took awhile for her to warm up to us but now we can handle her (my partner has put a LOT of time into socializing the birds. I handle them from incubation til the first week, and then handle their deaths and processing. He handles the majority of the socializing though I will sit and hang out and grab some of the problematic ones for some forced cuddles and telling them "see? I am not killing you."


Chicken tenders are legion, but can be kind of hard to find. I suppose, if I was going to take your path of one breed, I would suggest finding what your community has, maybe extending the search two to three hours from you. Those are the genetic pools you can draw from but you want to bring in outside stock. It just takes some planning.


For example, say you're lucky enough to have some Icelandics nearby, and you're in a place with bad winters. You could reach out to them and ask them where their stock is from. Now, it may be someplace like Greenfire, which is a good budget intro to some breeds and while they don't tend to have good chickens to breed standard, they do a lot of work bringing birds into the US (from what I can tell) and you can then breed up to standard with the help of their stock. Anyway, then you know that you need to source your Icelandic from elsewhere so that you have more diverse genetics. Then, later on, you and that other poultry person can trade eggs, or chickens (though eggs is the most bio-secure route.)


You don't want to start with what's locally available if you're thinking long term. You want to use them to diversify after your F1 stock (offspring of your first purchase) needs new mating partners is born, or old enough to mate.

 

[ChickenChick46]

Total side note that might not be true—I have never owned ducks but someone I know who does said that if they don’t learn to fly from another duck they won’t fly. Hopefully someone with more knowledge will chime in whether that’s true or not. I do trust the person who told me this I just know nothing about ducks.

I'm not sure if it's true either, but I do know that my neighbor had ducks and they never flew anywhere.

 

[talkinboutchickens]

Yes araucanas have a lethal gene as @BlindLemonChicken mentioned. And I also read that since they have no tails which would normally work to push feathers away from the vent for easy mating, they have decreased fertility. I'm sure there are tips and tricks Araucana breeders use to breed them though.
Have you checked out Greenfire Farms yet? They are located in Florida, and have tons of very rare breeds to choose from. Ones on my wishlist from there are indio gigante, mechelan turkey head, owlbeard, pavlovskaya, and vorwerks.

 

[McChooky]

If you truly just want to raise chickens as a hobby and for pets raising chickens that carry the lethal gene might not be for you