Suggest a dual purpose meat bird and why.

[Smoochie]

Not sure where you live but I'd start here looking for a breeder...
http://www.albc-usa.org/links.html#chickens

 

[Oregon Blues]

No breed does both eggs and meat well, except for some strains of Pekin ducks and Appleyard ducks. The breeds that do both eggs and meat aren't all that good at either one.

If you are looking for a self-sustaining flock after TSHTF, I suggest that you keep 2 flocks. One flock for eggs and the other for meat. Get Leghorns for eggs and either Dorking or True Cornish for your meat flock. The Dorkings and Cornish will lay plenty of eggs to be self-sustaining, but not enough eggs for your family to eat an omelet every morning.

The leghorns lay eggs like crazy and they are good to eat, but they don't have good feed conversion for the meat part of their production and the dressed birds are tiny. Their feed conversion for eggs is phenomenal. You will get a lot of eggs for your feed, just not much meat.

 

[chickened]

Delawares are a good dual purpose. They lay very well 250 to 300 eggs a year, were the standard for meat production before the CX and if you want the best DP for meat cross the Delawares to a Dark Cornish and you will get a more full carcass and improve on the DC laying.

 

[Smoochie]

I would have to agree with Oregon Blue.. I would do two flocks of meaties and layers over dual breeds.

 

[Newchickenguy]

Smoochie, could you explain what you mean by having a cycle going of 1styrs, 2nd yrs and then stewpot. Plz excuse my lack of understanidng on this if it is common knowledge. Also how big of a run minium size should I build if I plan on having 10 hens a rooster like you mentioned.

 

[Newchickenguy]

I never thought of having two flocks. Would keeping a 2nd flock of Dark Cornish be worth the extra feed? I herd that they have poor egg laying. But if they are a superior meat bird I am game for that. I am just trying to research this stuff as I am just now building a coop and gathering supplies. And yes I am doing this because I want the skills in handling chickens in place before the country sinks any further. I would love to just buy the CX birds but I just dont know how bad things are going to get. I need a self sustaining flock.

 

[Smoochie]

If eggs and meat were what I am after I would rather have a steady stream of eggs everyday and some broilers in the freezer quickly with less effort. . I never eat old hen as they just wouldn't be worth the effort as first off you can't dress them for the oven, only the crockpot, as they will be really chewy and second they aren't worth the trouble of butchering for such a small amount of meat.. I know others will disagree. Yes meat birds do eat a lot but you can process them in often half the time (plus your time is of value) for the same size or more. Is this a sustainable flock? .. No. You would need to develop your own mix.. You might need to have a different breed hen to hatch some eggs for you and mix in some lineage into meat birds as they are difficult to breed.

As for the sustainable cycle.. For example.. You start off with six point of lay hens and a rooster then come spring time hatch three chicks and add them to your flock. Next season add another three chicks and cull three of your worst 2 year layers.... And just keep a similar cycle of adding and culling.

 

[Smoochie]

You need 4 square feet per chicken in the coop for average size laying hens and outside double that. So around 12x8 coop & it will need nesting boxes and roosts. I would add salvaged windows as the natural light will encourage laying in the darker months.. Venting is also very important and the most is predator proofing.

 

[farmer boy]

i keep australorps they are good with laying eggs an average of 250 eggs per hen and the hens will weigh 7.3-9.2 pounds as adults and pullets 6.6-7.9 and a rooster will weigh 8.6-10.3 pounds and a cockerel 7-7.9 pounds. the skin color is white and light brown med size eggs. the colors they come in is black white and blue and the world record for the most eggs laid by one hen is 364 eggs out of 365 days. they are good nest sitters so the can hatch their own eggs for you. and if you want smaller birds the come as bantams to .. the ones i own are good foragers, docile, hardy not very flighty and they grow very fast they are not even full grown yet and their the size of my adult hens and the rooster is the size of my alpha rooster as they call it. i never had any problems with my australorps yet so i would choose them... and a little project im gonna do is cross breed my silkie rooster and a australorp to try to make a better mothering hen since they are both very good mothers and the silkies are bad eggs layers but australorps are good egg layers so i am gonna try to make a better egg layer and mother i will see how it works out next summer

 

[Smoochie]

I was thinking of Australorps also... I think all dual breed are pretty decent as they have been developed for many years.