What breeds are for eggs and meat?

[alexa009]

What breeds do people use for meat and what breeds for eggs? I have a different variety of them and was wondering. What is the meaning of dual purpose?

 

[Ol Grey Mare]

A dual purpose breed is one that has good egg production and a nice, fleshy body for meat production....as opposed to the smaller/lighter breeds that are excellent at converting feed to eggs or the larger/heavier breeds that are meaty but poorer in egg production. There are many breeds that fit in the dual purpose category so if eggs *and* meat are your goal and you don't want to manage separate flocks for each purpose that may be the route to take. It really boils down to your goals and what you consider good enough in number of eggs per hen or pounds of meat per bird/age at which you want to be able to process. Broiler breeds are best suited to short-term production goals where you want those meat birds at processing weight as quickly as possible and plan to process after a matter of weeks (8-20 depending) -- but if you are looking for a flock of birds that will be self-sustaining (keeping hens through 2-3 laying cycles then stewing them, eating extra cockerels that result from hatching your own eggs - raising a couple out now and then to replace an aging rooster, etc then dual purpose breeds are the way to look.