What's the Optimum Happy Flock Size?

[Mrs. K]

I am envious of you Kris, I do think a good rooster is essential to truly free ranging, but not all roosters are good. A series of wrecks for me, has really kiboshed my free ranging. I just added a rooster, maybe in the spring, I do love them out and about. But predators can wipe you out. Our coyotes are huge this year, and the coons are some of the smartest in the county.

Mrs K

 

[Kris5902]

I am envious of you Kris, I do think a good rooster is essential to truly free ranging, but not all roosters are good. A series of wrecks for me, has really kiboshed my free ranging. I just added a rooster, maybe in the spring, I do love them out and about. But predators can wipe you out. Our coyotes are huge this year, and the coons are some of the smartest in the county.

Mrs K

Good is the key when it comes to Roosters, I think. I’ve gone through a fair number of cockerels and roosters that weren’t ideal. It is partially genetics, partially husbandry, and a fair amount of luck in getting to the “Good” category. @Ridgerunner sums it up very well in their post. And I see much the same flock dynamics here as well.

I am lucky in that I have some local (to my end of the farm) Ravens that our Hunters are all instructed to leave be, regardless of what the farm manager suggests be done with the ones at the other end of the property. They discourage aerial predators very well, steal a fair number of my eggs, and actually protect my flock for me. Our only other predators are otters (though not in my area) raccoons, mink, and owls. As long as my roosters do their job and get everyone to bed
Nice and early, I close my roosting box doors and I don’t have to worry very much at all.

Two of my free range Roosters were partially raised by my boy Sammy. He accepted them as young cockerels with their sisters after an owl attack and bad winter weather forced me to combine his flock with some pullets I was raising up. There were two cockerels in there as well that didn’t get culled due to an overload at my processor and a booking error, I kept the most promising of the lot with the reasoning that I could always put them in the freezer for personal use if they really didn’t work out. I think being raised in a flock with a good rooster contributed to their success. I didn’t have a broody to raise them, but I think that may be even better at producing good, reliable free range chickens/roosters.

 

[Mrs. K]

I agree. Many on here do not think much of rooster protection, but I do think they are a huge help for day time predation. Things I look for:

• he needs to be the first bird to see you when you approach the coop
• he needs to be nice
• he needs to stick with the girls, and keep them gathered up

I started with an all hen flock, once a month or so would loose a hen to daytime predation, once my 2nd rooster turned 1 year old, that stopped.

I have had another rooster, take on a coyote - he lost, but I still had my flock.

I have really never had enough birds for a second rooster, so over the years, I have been with and without roosters.

Mrs K

 

[Ridgerunner]

• he needs to stick with the girls, and keep them gathered up

Dad's did not do that. I hate to think of one rooster trying to keep 25 to 30 free ranging hens gathered into one tight flock. He would not have time to eat or do any other roosterly things. A core group of hens stuck close to the rooster but the others were scattered all over in small cliques or sub-flocks. Sometimes they'd come together, sometimes they didn't.

I free ranged mine in Arkansas the first few years until the dog attacks and I switched to electric netting. With one rooster and eight hens three hens would wander off by themselves. Those were not the ones attacked by the dogs. I don't think of it as him sticking with the girls as much as whether the girls want to stick with him. Some of those girls have minds of their own.

I'm sure we manage them differently, have different set-ups, different numbers and ratios, and different goals. We are bound to get different results and form different opinions. It's always interesting to me to see what some of these differences are and why.

 

[Ruthster55]

I discussed a higher optimum flock size than most of the other posters. Optimum flock size all depends on the type and size of coop and run that is involved. I am thinking more of farm conditions and a property that has a bit more than 1 acre.

A city or suburban lot with a small coop and run probably has an ideal flock size of around 4-5 hens, with no roosters.

Part of the reason for a larger flock size on a farm is so that selective breeding is possible.

On a farm, I always keep at least one rooster. I believe that the flock behaves in a more natural manner when there is a rooster present. They help with free-ranging, although there also needs to be some sort of security around the run. My chickens currently have a closed run, but it is rather large.

In my experience, broody-raised roosters have better temperaments, on average, than human-raised roosters. If there is a group of five roosters, and they all have an OK to good temperament, then they can be selected on things like breed characteristics. Whereas, if there is a group of five human-raised roosters, there might be three meanies and only two nice ones to choose from.

Of course, the other reason to keep a rooster is to get baby chicks!

I believe that one rooster can service up to 20 hens, but optimum fertility would be around 10 hens per rooster.

 

[HappyFluffButts]

Ok, lots of replies and questions, thank you! I wasn't expecting such a quick and full response!
Several of you had similar questions about the setup, so I will try to answer those below:

1. What is a "Food Forest"? Also known as "agroforestry," a food forest is permaculture modeled after the complimentary plant systems we see in forests. The different levels of canopy height and root deepness allows complimentary plants to grow side by side without competing for sunlight, nutrients, etc. There are several successful ones up and running in my area (Provo UT), which is how I learned about them.


My end goal is to set one up in a publicly accessible place (think like a park) with a modest admittance fee so families can go in, enjoy nature, learn about how it works, and gather food for themselves. I would love to help inspire families and local government to try it for themselves.


The problem is land is always expensive in the city proper, so we will start with cheap land in the country near us. That way we can get the hang of food forestry, provide food for our family, and build up resources to eventually propagate a future city location with.


If you want to learn more about food forestry, here are some links:


https://www.permaculturenews.org/2011/10/21/why-food-forests/


https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/what-is-permaculture-food-forests


https://www.permaculturenews.org/20...ction-three-years-update-wadi-rum-consultancy/


2. Where's the project location? We are looking for land near our home in Provo, Utah. The plots I am looking at are either in the foothills/mountains to the east or the flat farm/pasture/undeveloped land to the west of Provo


3. What are the chickens for? I have always loved chickens and wished I could keep a bigger flock with roos, so the country plot would be the perfect opportunity to do that. I can try new breeds, fertilize the soil, and use the proceeds of selling eggs/chicks/chicken meat towards buying some of the more expensive trees and plants we'd like to propagate.


4. Which Breeds will I use? To be honest, I'm still in the process of deciding that. I mentioned in the initial post that I'd like to raise Cream Legbars, Bielefelders -- those I would sell to backyard flocks to make autosexing chickens more well known/accessible in my locale. The American Bresse would be for selling eggs and meat.


I've raised and kept several types of chickens -- Rhode Island Reds, Barred Plymouth Rocks, Leghorns, Australorps, and Red Sex Links, to name a few. While I adore certain of the sexlinks and would love to breed a flock of them, I learned about European autosexing chickens that can be sexed at birth AND continue to do so generation after generation.


These breeds are popular in the UK but are not yet well known in the USA. This seems a shame to me as I know many backyard chicken keepers who like to hatch their own chicks, but are not allowed to keep the roosters. Everything's fine and dandy until 5 months in, your favorite pullet starts crowing, the neighbors complain, and the city tells you to get rid of your rooster ASAP (don't ask me how I know about that). Once you're bonded to a chicken, it's really hard to let them go to some random person to be turned to soup! It would be soooo much easier to know from the getgo which chicks are hens and which are cockerels so you can plan accordingly. SO, that got me thinking that maybe I could breed and sell autosexing chickens on the food forest land to make the breeds more popular/available in my area while they fertilize my soil.


I've been keeping tabs on what kinds of chickens people are selling/buying locally, and I think Cream Legbars would be a good fit for people who like Easter Eggers, and Bielefelders would be a good fit for people who like RIRs and BPRs.


Next spring I will get 3 Cream Legbars to see how I like them and gauge local interest in them. Once our current Lohmann Browns die (they tend to have a shorter life span than heritage breeds), we'll get some Bielefelders and do the same thing.


Where do the American Bresse come in? I know if I start breeding and selling fertilized eggs, chicks, and chickens, people will inevitably want more females than males... so I want to set up humane bachelor pens for the autosexed roos to grow up in until they can be sold as meat. :/


If I can give them a humane life and can tolerate raising them for slaughter, then I would give raising American Bresse a try. Besides being productive layers of large cream colored eggs, their meat is world-renowned for its high quality marbling. They would be a good breed for producing consistent revenue (eggs in the warm months, meat in the cold). I already have three potential outlets for selling their eggs and meat, so we'll see how that pans out.


5. How will I keep the chickens? This is a question a lot of you had. My experience with chickens is letting them free range in a yard or pen with access to a coop, water, and additional feed. And having a dog to keep predators at bay. So that is the model I was thinking of following: fencing each breed into their own block of foraging area with their own coop, water, and additional feed.


But I liked the idea some of you mentioned in your responses of doing chicken tractors -- I think that would work well for separating the flocks so they can enjoy aspects of free ranging without mingling with the other breeds, and I would have more control over collecting chicks, eggs, etc, than the former setup. So, that was a great suggestion there, thank you!


If you have any more thoughts based on all that, let me know!
I will also go back through the replies and see if there were any other questions I missed.


Thank you so much for all your input, guys! ^_^

 

[Ruthster55]

Ok, lots of replies and questions, thank you! I wasn't expecting such a quick and full response!
Several of you had similar questions about the setup, so I will try to answer those below:

1. What is a "Food Forest"? Also known as "agroforestry," a food forest is permaculture modeled after the complimentary plant systems we see in forests. The different levels of canopy height and root deepness allows complimentary plants to grow side by side without competing for sunlight, nutrients, etc. There are several successful ones up and running in my area (Provo UT), which is how I learned about them.


My end goal is to set one up in a publicly accessible place (think like a park) with a modest admittance fee so families can go in, enjoy nature, learn about how it works, and gather food for themselves. I would love to help inspire families and local government to try it for themselves.


The problem is land is always expensive in the city proper, so we will start with cheap land in the country near us. That way we can get the hang of food forestry, provide food for our family, and build up resources to eventually propagate a future city location with.


If you want to learn more about food forestry, here are some links:


https://www.permaculturenews.org/2011/10/21/why-food-forests/


https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/what-is-permaculture-food-forests


https://www.permaculturenews.org/20...ction-three-years-update-wadi-rum-consultancy/


2. Where's the project location? We are looking for land near our home in Provo, Utah. The plots I am looking at are either in the foothills/mountains to the east or the flat farm/pasture/undeveloped land to the west of Provo


3. What are the chickens for? I have always loved chickens and wished I could keep a bigger flock with roos, so the country plot would be the perfect opportunity to do that. I can try new breeds, fertilize the soil, and use the proceeds of selling eggs/chicks/chicken meat towards buying some of the more expensive trees and plants we'd like to propagate.


4. Which Breeds will I use? To be honest, I'm still in the process of deciding that. I mentioned in the initial post that I'd like to raise Cream Legbars, Bielefelders -- those I would sell to backyard flocks to make autosexing chickens more well known/accessible in my locale. The American Bresse would be for selling eggs and meat.


I've raised and kept several types of chickens -- Rhode Island Reds, Barred Plymouth Rocks, Leghorns, Australorps, and Red Sex Links, to name a few. While I adore certain of the sexlinks and would love to breed a flock of them, I learned about European autosexing chickens that can be sexed at birth AND continue to do so generation after generation.


These breeds are popular in the UK but are not yet well known in the USA. This seems a shame to me as I know many backyard chicken keepers who like to hatch their own chicks, but are not allowed to keep the roosters. Everything's fine and dandy until 5 months in, your favorite pullet starts crowing, the neighbors complain, and the city tells you to get rid of your rooster ASAP (don't ask me how I know about that). Once you're bonded to a chicken, it's really hard to let them go to some random person to be turned to soup! It would be soooo much easier to know from the getgo which chicks are hens and which are cockerels so you can plan accordingly. SO, that got me thinking that maybe I could breed and sell autosexing chickens on the food forest land to make the breeds more popular/available in my area while they fertilize my soil.


I've been keeping tabs on what kinds of chickens people are selling/buying locally, and I think Cream Legbars would be a good fit for people who like Easter Eggers, and Bielefelders would be a good fit for people who like RIRs and BPRs.


Next spring I will get 3 Cream Legbars to see how I like them and gauge local interest in them. Once our current Lohmann Browns die (they tend to have a shorter life span than heritage breeds), we'll get some Bielefelders and do the same thing.


Where do the American Bresse come in? I know if I start breeding and selling fertilized eggs, chicks, and chickens, people will inevitably want more females than males... so I want to set up humane bachelor pens for the autosexed roos to grow up in until they can be sold as meat. :/


If I can give them a humane life and can tolerate raising them for slaughter, then I would give raising American Bresse a try. Besides being productive layers of large cream colored eggs, their meat is world-renowned for its high quality marbling. They would be a good breed for producing consistent revenue (eggs in the warm months, meat in the cold). I already have three potential outlets for selling their eggs and meat, so we'll see how that pans out.


5. How will I keep the chickens? This is a question a lot of you had. My experience with chickens is letting them free range in a yard or pen with access to a coop, water, and additional feed. And having a dog to keep predators at bay. So that is the model I was thinking of following: fencing each breed into their own block of foraging area with their own coop, water, and additional feed.


But I liked the idea some of you mentioned in your responses of doing chicken tractors -- I think that would work well for separating the flocks so they can enjoy aspects of free ranging without mingling with the other breeds, and I would have more control over collecting chicks, eggs, etc, than the former setup. So, that was a great suggestion there, thank you!


If you have any more thoughts based on all that, let me know!
I will also go back through the replies and see if there were any other questions I missed.


Thank you so much for all your input, guys! ^_^

Good post. I like the ideas of the autosexing breeds, blue eggs, and a possible meat breed.

I’m thinking more about how much land is available and how you will keep your chickens safe.

How much land in these areas near Provo are you thinking about (and can afford)? Are we talking about 1 acre or 50? Knowing the size of the land that you are contemplating is very helpful in assessing an ideal flock size.

What are the predator pressures in the area? Are there a lot of coyotes or raccoons? Or loose dogs?

Will you be buying land with a house, or land without a house?

The question sounds irrelevant, but yes, it affects chickens. Why does a house or no house on land affect the chickens? If the land has a house, you can live there on the rural land, and you can be there most of the time to take care of the chickens (and the orchards/food forest).

Whereas if there’s no house, there will be a lot of times when you will not be present on the land except for a few days per week, or while building a house out there. It’s often best to not have chickens at all until there is a house (even a really basic one) and the chickens’ coop/run are built. Predators can do a lot of damage if the chicken keeper isn’t there.

Any possibility that you might move from the place in town to the food forest land?

 

[HappyFluffButts]

Good post. I like the ideas of the autosexing breeds, blue eggs, and a possible meat breed.

I’m thinking more about how much land is available and how you will keep your chickens safe.

How much land in these areas near Provo are you thinking about (and can afford)? Are we talking about 1 acre or 50? Knowing the size of the land that you are contemplating is very helpful in assessing an ideal flock size.

What are the predator pressures in the area? Are there a lot of coyotes or raccoons? Or loose dogs?

Will you be buying land with a house, or land without a house?

The question sounds irrelevant, but yes, it affects chickens. Why does a house or no house on land affect the chickens? If the land has a house, you can live there on the rural land, and you can be there most of the time to take care of the chickens (and the orchards/food forest).

Whereas if there’s no house, there will be a lot of times when you will not be present on the land except for a few days per week, or while building a house out there. It’s often best to not have chickens at all until there is a house (even a really basic one) and the chickens’ coop/run are built. Predators can do a lot of damage if the chicken keeper isn’t there.

Any possibility that you might move from the place in town to the food forest land?

The land would be 2-4 acres, with no house, and would not build a house on it for many many years at least. (We own our house in Provo and rent out the basement, so I don't see us moving soon. It doesn't have the space for more than 6 chickens or a food forest though, which is why we are looking at unhoused land near us for that)
As far as predators go, I've seen hawks and skunks out here. There are occasional cougar sightings, especially more towards the foothills/mountains, and I'm told we have coyotes and owls here. I'm sure predator proofing will be high on the project list for building their coops and pens! I've only had to deal with opposums, raccoons, dogs, and hawks before. What I've learned is it's important to have good fences (dogs), lots of cover to hide under (hawks), and close up the coop as soon as it starts to get dark (opposums, raccoons). I've noticed that a lot of predators keep their distance when we have a dog, even if he's not around the chickens 24/7. Our current dog does a good job of chasing off predators, even hawks (he's a German shepherd/Australian shepherd mix). I could see us getting another dog like him. I'm not sure what additional measures are important for protecting against cougars or coyotes though.

 

[Ruthster55]

The land would be 2-4 acres, with no house, and would not build a house on it for many many years at least. (We own our house in Provo and rent out the basement, so I don't see us moving soon. It doesn't have the space for more than 6 chickens or a food forest though, which is why we are looking at unhoused land near us for that)
As far as predators go, I've seen hawks and skunks out here. There are occasional cougar sightings, especially more towards the foothills/mountains, and I'm told we have coyotes and owls here. I'm sure predator proofing will be high on the project list for building their coops and pens! I've only had to deal with opposums, raccoons, dogs, and hawks before. What I've learned is it's important to have good fences (dogs), lots of cover to hide under (hawks), and close up the coop as soon as it starts to get dark (opposums, raccoons). I've noticed that a lot of predators keep their distance when we have a dog, even if he's not around the chickens 24/7. Our current dog does a good job of chasing off predators, even hawks (he's a German shepherd/Australian shepherd mix). I could see us getting another dog like him. I'm not sure what additional measures are important for protecting against cougars or coyotes though.

I dunno.

In my experience, most chickens require care at least twice per day. At a minimum, that means opening the coop and/or run and feeding + watering them in the morning and then feeding + watering and closing the coop around dusk. Some of this can be automated especially if you have a nipple water system and large feeders. You can get automatic door openers-closers and a surveillance camera(s) to monitor the chickens remotely. Are you ready to shell out for all that?

Chickens are great for people who live on the land where they also keep their flock! I am a lot more skeptical about keeping chickens on land that is only visited occasionally.

I guess if you were raising a semi-feral flock that roosts in trees, they would require less care. However, I don’t think that is what you’re interested in.

One or two feeder calves on adequate grass (in an appropriate season) require less care than a typical chicken flock. You don’t need to open and close their pasture in the morning and late afternoon. You would just need to fence up a few potreros (pasture areas) and move the feeder calves every few days to keep the pasture fresh. Have you considered a couple of beef calves for manure while you’re starting out planting the orchard and are mostly staying at the house in town? When the calves got big or started to require too much hay or supplemental (purchased) feed, you could just sell them. There might not be much profit in selling a couple of larger calves in the fall, but at least they provided manure during the spring and summer.

Larger calves are a lot more resistant to predators than chickens. Everything likes to eat chicken!

In my experience, pigs require more care and a lot more supplemental feed than chickens. Joel Salatin has success foraging pigs in Virginia, which is a lot wetter than Utah.

If any of the hens go broody and hatch baby chicks, they would need to be checked between 3 and 5 times per day, depending on the size of the brood. A small brood needs less feed, so checking 3 times a day is usually enough. And having hens raise chickies is a lot easier than brooding incubator or hatchery chicks! (In a semi-feral flock, there wouldn’t be a need for that sort of checking - you could just leave feed and a water source and let the mama hens figure everything out. I doubt that’s what you want, though).

As far as the food forest and orchard go, I can see tending those things once or twice per week. Maybe one day weeding and cleaning up and Saturdays for hosting visitors when there is less covid. Do you have two days available off from work and family duties to devote to the new land? (I believe that hiring a ranch hand to build fences and plant trees would be really expensive).

I think the initial orchard planting might go best along with installing some fences and getting 1 or 2 calves rather than trying to watch and tend a chicken flock remotely. Calves are great to have in a pasture area before chickens are there. Cow pies attract lots of bugs that are great for chickens later on when they have a coop and run and someone can spend a bit more time with them.

Just my humble opinion.

 

[JedJackson]

There is no sweet spot or optimum flock size. You have to decide what is optimum for you and your family's needs, and what best fits your resources. Take into account the needs of each bird with feed, feeders and waterers, coop space requirements, roost space requirements, predator prevention, costs, and other considerations, and then form a plan. The amount of time you have to care for them should be a big factor, too.