Time to breed chickens... Which rooster will be the father?

[maf2008]

I have several breeds and its time to get a clutch of fertile eggs.

(I keep roos in another pen to not bother the hens too much!)

I want the RIR for about 4 days when the hens...I want most of the crosses to be from this roo.....

Then I want to switch to the Leghorn roo in the pens with the hens... (Both roos have mated before)

Will the RIR be the father of most of them?

Should I put in both roosters at the same time.???.. They were raised together and will not fight.

Should I just have one batch from the RIR and the next batch from the leghorn? What do you do? I do not want to seperate int seperate pens. All advice appreciated. Thanks

 

[crazyhen]

Hens can stay fertile for a couple of weeks at least from a mating so you would have to have a month with no roo before you introduce the second roo. Do it seperately. Gloria Jean

 

[Ridgerunner]

I would not put the two roosters in at the same time. Put in one at a time, a mature rooster can dominate a flock so there is probably not that much disruption to the pecking order. If you put in two at the same time, they will probably reestablish which is dominant. Could be messy.

I don't know how many eggs you want in a clutch or how long it will take you to collect that many eggs. This Texas A&M site is pretty good about how to store eggs for incubation, either in an incubator or under a broody.

http://gallus.tamu.edu/Extension publications/b6092.pdf

Eggs are usually fertile two days after a mating and usually stay fertile for two weeks. Three weeks is possible, so waiting four weeks after you have removed the first rooster is necessary to be sure who the daddy is. Depending on the number of hens and the vigor of the rooster, the rooster may not mate with all the hens the first day you put him with the flock so it may be several days before all eggs are fertile. If you take out one rooster and put in another, egg laying may (not necessarily will, but may) be disrupted a few days while he establishes his dominance.

There are too many variables for me to be able to tell you what to do. Some of those variables only you can decide, such as how strongly you feel about the RIR being the father of most. Hopefully this info will help you decide what is the best course for you.

Good luck!