When breeding your chickens

[RollinWithTheStones]

do you keep your lines pure or just let them breed "mutts"?

When getting rid of chicks are people sticklers about pure breeds or do they only care about egg color? I see purebreds on CL for $10 each but "mutts" are going for $1 each.

 

[Jloeffler]

This an awesome question. I've been wondering the same thing! Hopefully someone more knowledgable than me will respond!

 

[RollinWithTheStones]

If I can hide my roo I'd love to have a few chicks from him. I think he's purty and would make pretty babies.

 

[cubalaya]

there is a hybridism and vigorousness on the part of crossbred and sexlink chickens. they may lay great, get big quickly, and look cool but in the end they are not pure and wont usually breed pure in the next generations. there is also grading where a little blood is added to a line to achieve something that the pure line didn't have. i have tried the sexlinks and think they are cannabilistic and lay themselves out quickly. tried the crossbreeding but in the end they are still mutts. tried grading with the australorps and will stick to the pure from now on. only pure breeds for me.

 

[jlgoinggreen]

I sell eggs for consumption. The only thing I have "mutts" (really hate that word lol) of are my Easter Eggers (Ameraucanas X Buff Orpingtons). Some of my EEs lay light color brown eggs and some lay greenish/blue eggs. My customers love the different colors of their eggs. I also have "true" Ameraucanas and FBCMs (no longer have BO) so they are getting a cool variety of egg colors.

As for selling chickens, around March/April I sold all of my extra EEs at the going rate of the Ameraucanas. My customer were told they were not true Ameraucanas, but crosses. They did not care and were just excited about getting the "easter" eggs and birds who are great layers.

One thing I can say about that cross (Ameraucanas X BO) is they are my best layers. They kept laying right through winter with no problem. If you have buyers who are just buying your chickens for laying/egg consumption, they may just pay a good price for the laying quality of the birds like my customers did.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Quote:
I purposely breed mutts. I see no reason for me to get into the purebreed thing. I do not sell or show my chickens. Mine are for eggs and meat, and I enjoy the excitement of never knowing what a chick I hatch will look like. We all have different goals. Some people really like purebreeds, even if they are not into showing them. I'm not bashing them.

It takes real work when breeding chickens to get or maintain certain traits. To get purebreeds that can be shown without being disqualified is hard, takes hatching a lot of chicks, and requires real knowledge of what you are trying to accomplish and how to go about that. You can get hatchery chicks and breed them. They will breed pretty true to colors and patterns, but unless you really work at it, you lose conformation and a lot of other traits. They may be "purebreeds" but they are a world apart from the birds a true breeder that knows what they are doing will produce. By selecting my breeders in my mutt flock, I think I am getting chickens that meet my egg and meat goals as well or better than many "purebreed" flocks of chickens from hatchery birds.

If you are selling chicks or hatching eggs, you can get more for "purebreeds". As a matter of ethics, I suggest you go to some shows, talk to a few breeders and maybe judges so you know what traits and characteristics you should be breeding for, and select your breeding flock based on that. Or you can just get hatchery stock and sell those for more on CL. There is a sucker born every minute.

 

[Fred's Hens]

In my experience, the purer the breeding, the higher quality the breeding, the better the birds; the more money they command. That's obvious. Most folks like the various breeds. If we didn't breed for quality and breed purity maintenance, all these breeds would quickly disappear into a blended sea of sameness.

With most pure breeds, one can be assured of some trait predictability in terms of size, personality, POL, feed requirements, broody tendencies, body weight, egg size, egg color, etc. These features is what makes each breed somewhat unique and makes keeping chickens interesting, imho. With third generation barnyard mixes, who knows? That sense of uniqueness kind of gets lost and muddled. Just my $02.

 

[Wynette]

It's not necessarily true that the better the birds, the more money they command. I have both purebeds and mutts - my olive egger POL pullets sell for more (around here) than my purebreds do, as 95% of folks looking for laying hens are looking for good layers. Period. They don't care what the breed is. This could be a geographical thing? I dunno.

However, I WILL say that a very well bred purebred chicken will most definitely fetch higher prices. But - you'll not sell nearly as many of THOSE as you will plain old good layers. That's my experience, anyway.

In the end, breed what YOU enjoy, regardless of the reason. Good layer? Pretty birds? Purebred birds? Whatever makes you happy at the end of the day, that's what you ought to do, IMO.

 

[KDailey]

I just recently went to see a guy about some Old English Game Bantams that my neighbor told me about. She said he had really nice birds and we should go together and get some. Turns out he breeds for show quality. He had a TON of birds and was asking $50 a pair. Well I'm not into showing as of yet, maybe in the future but not right now until we get all of our pens set up and a good system down.

I wound up buying the pairs that didn't quite meet the mark. They tried to convince me to get the show quality birds. Apparantly they don't sell all that many birds around here, mostly only when they actually go somewhere to sell. So they've had other people come and ask for the less than quality birds. I got two pairs for $45 total.

Yes you can ask for more money with purebreds or show quality but you won't have as many buyers.

 

[RollinWithTheStones]

Thanks everyone, I like a little variety and I like them to look unique