The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Poultry & Waterfowl => Topic started by: Moleskins on July 25, 2012, 05:55:02 pm
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To add to the occasional pigs, the full time bees and sheep we're tempted to try some chickens.
This question comes up on the sheep forum a lot ........ so here goes on the poultry side.
What breed do I buy, regular eggs would be good and tame or easy to catch.
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I would always encourage people to get traditional pure breeds but if its just eggs you want and not that bothered then hybrids are cheaper and give you plenty of eggs.
If you do want pure breeds then there are plenty to choose from such as light sussex, Rhode island red, dorking , the list is long.
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Just a thought - is there any reason you need to catch them. If they need "things doing" then after they have gone to sleep on the perches is a good time.
Probably if you want them as tame pets, I have heard that Buff Orpington, Cochin etc are good, though presumably they won't be great in the egg producing department.
If you are more interested in just egg production then go for a standard hybird such as any of the Brown commercial Warren types, and they are generally pretty quiet, or I have heard White Star are really good layers though flighty. Black Rocks are good all-rounders, but need plenty of free range or can become a bit pecky.
If egg quality rather than quantity is paramount then my choice is Cuckoo Marans and Cream Legbars, though in both of these a good utility based strain make a good account of themselves in the egg laying department, and can become really tame if time is spent with them.
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Well I'm always arguing for the quality of meat from pigs and sheep and the quality of honey from a beekeeper as opposed to the supermarket stuff so really should be the same on the eggs.
Thank you for the suggestions, any others? Going to get the OH to have a look at them, as with all stock, I think it's important to like what you're looking after.
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You could always get a variety of breeds so you have different coloured eggs.
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I've got three issues with hybrids Moleskins:-
They are all innoculated so they will potentially transmit viruses to any that haven't been at any time in the future. So if you start with hybrids and decide to go for more colour and shape you will be struggling to find Pedigrees that have also been innoculated with the same viruses and therefore are taking a risk.
Whilst they do lay a lot in a year they exhaust themselves quickly and 3 years is old for a hybrid. None of ours have got that far. Some are just as friendly as Pedigrees though.
People tell us our eggs are the best they have ever tasted. We now have customers without putting the signs up and are constantly sold out. All our chickens are Pedigrees which lay less but lay slower. I think that improves the taste a lot.
We have Blue Orpingtons. 5 years old and still laying good sized eggs regularly. Very friendly as well. Buffs tend to get rather messy and originate from a different breeding programme.
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If egg production is your main aim, hybrids are hard to beat. If you buy POL pullets now they should lay right through the winter and continue to lay really well for the first 18- 24 months. After that egg numbers will decrease gradually but egg size usually increase. They tend not to live for so long and as they naturally die off, can be replaced ...... hence a constant egg supply. We have had hybrids live until 10 years of age though. ;D They tend to be calm and easily handled. My daughter has some Warren types that you literally fall over, constantly under your feet ::)
Pure breeds are supposed to live longer and although they lay fewer eggs per year should continue for more years. Mine do not lay that well through the winter even as young birds. They give you range of egg colours and sizes eg. araucanas for blue eggs and interesting plummage etc. Though there are now many different hybrids to choose from eg. bluebells, white star. Some pure breeds are calm and easy to handle but others can be flighty. Some breeds, like pekins are not good layers but great pets for children.
We have utility RIRs and my father has utility Wyandottes these tend to be good layers but not as many per year as hybrids. I find they take longer to reach POL than hybrids (in general). They are easy to handle.
I think choice depends on your reason for keeping.
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If you get Cream Legbars they are rare breed so its good to support that, but also they are colour coded at birth (males different from females) so its easy to see what you've got and although its rubbish to have to dispatch a male chick its a lot easier than when they are fully grown - cockerels can take a bit of killing. Other than that our Rhode Island Reds have been first class, now old ladies at 6 and still laying superbly, not nervous and lovely colouring.
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How many chooks are you thinking of getting? I ask because you could try some warrens and some pure breeds and see what you get on with.
I bought some pullets from Rosie Posie on here and I have found them very tame (catchable, stroke their chests and follow me like my gang) these are light sussex and other sussex variety. I think it isn't just the breed but how they are reared. You won't regret getting chickens.
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We were torn about the breed to start with, last year, and only wanted 4 . After going down the supporting rare breeds thought, eventually decided on hybrids. The main reason being we didn't know what to expect in becoming hen owners and our main aim was self-sufficiency in eggs. They each are a different type and lay different coloured eggs.
We realise they won't live as long as pure breeds but thought if it had been a bad idea we didn't have too many years of regret, and if we loved it then we could add a couple every 2 or 3 years.
Problem now is that we love having them and do want more but these are vaccinated. We now have a decision about what to purchase, and from where, due to the vaccination scenario.
But we cannot complain, the eggs are great And they each lay most days, giving plenty supply for ourselves and swaps for other items. :chook:
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I'm glad I asked now, there's always plenty of info on TAS.
If we had hybrids and wanted to change can you just move the coop to another piece of land and re stock with all new birds or would you need to change the coop too, due to the vaccine problem?
I would imagine going for about 4 or 6 hens and hope to sell some eggs if we're getting too many for our own use.
My inclination is for the pure / rare breed route though. I've had look on t'internet to see where you can buy some of various breeds, they appear to be £15 to £20 each would that be about right?
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Yes, that sounds about right.
My father paid about £7 each for utility RIR's and Wyandottes ..... as growers.
Not sure how much of a problem the vaccination thing is. I know lots of people who keep both and haven't had any problems. Heard its possible but not sure how common/likely it is.
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I would go for a pure breed myself and the Faverolles are a lovely friendly bird, not too flighty and good winter layers. A lot of birds stop laying in the winter which would be a problem if you have customers. I also like to go for dual purpose birds, so if I get any cockerels they then get fattened up for the table. For this reason you'd want to steer clear of any 'show quality birds'. We hatch our own from eggs sent through the post. Our Faverolles were tasty but I've now got some 4 wk old dual purpose chicks which are a selection of Ixworth, Jersey Giant and Welsh Black (these are an Australorp Indian Game X) and are all meant to be full of flavour. The chicks I hatch purely for the table are Hubbards from Simon Skinner as they are ready for the table in a matter of weeks but they do eat a lot. Full of flavour though!
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very soon all hens will be vaccinate id get Sussex and roads from a good breeder utility stock .the vaccine is done to safe keep the hens and give them a longer life .i do not do the hens for sale , only my own stock . :-*
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They are all innoculated so they will potentially transmit viruses to any that haven't been at any time in the future.
Wait up, how does that work Chris?
Surely if a hen is innoculated, that makes it immune to that particular virus, since it will be carrying the relevant antibodies in its bloodstream.
That doesn't mean it's carrying the virus itself though, and I'd have thought your pure breed hens would be more likely to catch something from other newly introduced pure breeds, rather than the hybrids (since they won't be carriers, and won't be vulnerable to the disease either)?
However, I see a few folks have echoed your point of view, so I'm going to stand back now ready to be corrected.......
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I wondered about this too Womble. Is it a wives tale? People used to be worried about vaccinated dogs affecting unvacc ones but that doesn't happen now.
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I have read about it in several places but don't know anyone that has had an incident confirmed by a vet ??? .
Think I will ask my vet next time I'm there.
Any vets on here? ???
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Does this explain it, or am I getting confused?
http://www.noahcompendium.co.uk/Ceva_Animal_Health_Ltd/CEVAC_Transmune_lyophilisate_for_suspension_for_injection_with_solvent_for_chicken/-43706.html (http://www.noahcompendium.co.uk/Ceva_Animal_Health_Ltd/CEVAC_Transmune_lyophilisate_for_suspension_for_injection_with_solvent_for_chicken/-43706.html)
para 4
[size=0px]The vaccine virus is excreted by vaccinated birds and can spread to susceptible birds and can be detected in unvaccinated birds 4-7 days later. To control the spread of the virus, the immunisation devices used for injection and the hatchery premises should be decontaminated after vaccination.[/size]
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I am very new to having chickens and my Buff Orpingtons are fantastic :love:
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Boy this question opened up a can of worms ;D ;D
Thanks for all the advice I keep Googling the various breeds to see what they look like :D
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Theres a bit more to it than just picking a breed you like the look of and other factors have to be taken into account.
The housing and feeding and amount of time you spend on husbandry. No two systems are the same and 1 keeper could be succsessful with a strain and another fail to get the birds to reach the potential of that strain, you notice I state strain not breed, as there is a huge difference between them.
If your looking to breed your own replacements from your birds don't get commercial hybrids. Breeding from your original choice makes sence, as buying in new birds buys in health risks. Breed your own and run a closed flock system.
If your breeding you need to get a breed and that the cockerels are a decent size for table work, as it's a total waste to cull young males and dump them.
As for egg colour White eggs are usually from the best layers followed by Buff, Blue and finally brown and the darker the brown the fewer the eggs.
Lots more information on my web page and facebook page.
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Summary
Poultry vaccines are widely applied to prevent and control contagious poultry
diseases. Their use in poultry production is aimed at avoiding or minimising the
emergence of clinical disease at farm level, thus increasing production.
Vaccines and vaccination programmes vary broadly in regard to several local
factors (e.g. type of production, local pattern of disease, costs and potential
losses) and are generally managed by the poultry industry. In the last decade, the
?nancial losses caused by the major epidemic diseases of poultry (avian
in?uenza and Newcastle disease) have been enormous for both the commercial
and the public sectors. Thus, vaccination should also be applied in the
framework of poultry disease eradication programmes at national or regional
levels under the of?cial supervision of public Veterinary Services. This paper
provides insight on the use of vaccination for the control of poultry infections,
with particular emphasis on the control of transboundary poultry diseases.
Keywords
Avian in?uenza – Disease control – Newcastle disease – Poultry – Vaccination strategy
– Vaccine – Vaccine ef?cacy.
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I do know what you mean by buying a breed that's right not what you like the look of. The same applies with the sheep, but you do need to like them, as I've said on the sheep forum, when you've got to get intimate it's a lot easier if you like the animal ........ stop thinking that, it's not what I mean and you know it :D Plain brown birds are bit boring, feathery legs are going to get messy, Gold Laced Wyandottes are probably what I'd go for on looks.
Having looked into this a bit I think we'd want a reasonable amount of eggs from birds that can cope with a bad Winter if we get one again. That can be eaten, though at this stage I don't want to breed them myself I think I'd try buying eggs in at first. And as has been said the cock birds have to go.
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Hi Victorian Farmer
Nice bit of info and well put. Do you have the link for it? :thumbsup:
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http://www.poultryhub.org/health/health-management/vaccination/ (http://www.poultryhub.org/health/health-management/vaccination/) http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/ps030 (http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/ps030) http://www.ehow.com/how_2073075_vaccinate-chicken.html (http://www.ehow.com/how_2073075_vaccinate-chicken.html) 2 good reads for you dark brown eggs ,as things gone well eney new stock .iv been into utility roads roadbar etc .people dont wont rare breeds they wont egg layers forfar mart £80 4 blue bells ,haw things have changed .i hope all is well with you .all the best
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Any vets on here? ???
Don't know, but I found a tame one and asked her. She basically said that this shouldn't be a problem since most vaccines are 'dead', i.e. they can't transmit the actual disease, so the vaccinated hybrid hens would not be carriers of that disease (the vaccine didn't give it to them, and also made them immune from catching it from another source).
Note, she didn't say it couldn't happen (depending on the specific disease / vaccine), but did say that in her opinion it was pretty unlikely, and there are probably more important things to worry about in life ;) .
So Moleskins, Very sorry for hijaking your thread! I suggest that you buy whatever birds you like the look of, but keep in mind factors like hardiness and laying rate. Actually, when we started out, we went to a breeder, sat down in his pen and stuck our hands out full of grain. Funnily enough, the birds that chose us turned out to be real crackers! ;D
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I only got my first hens just over a year ago and had a similar discussion - in the end I went for 4 different hybrids to start with, I wanted eggs not meat from them and a way of telling one from t'other helped plus I also couldn't make up my mind and wanted more than one breed ;)
I then took on some BHWT spent hens in November and as they feathered up and started laying again, and the POLs didn't moult that first year, I had loads of eggs - I imagine this winter will be a different story as the BHWTs will be 2-3year old and the hybrids will all go into moult - hence considering taking on some more but for various reasons I have delayed that urge for now.
My advice, such as it is, is to go for something robust and productive, possibly more than one breed so you can compare how you get on with each and then get more of those once you've had time to decide based on your own experience and your surroundings/facilities. Easier to get a few more than to manage too much to start with or realise you've gone all out for one breed and it's not the one for you or your home area..
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Thank you Ellied seems like good advice, I also like the idea of letting the hens pick you, seems as good a way as any.
We've a sale soon at the local auction mart so I'm trying to get fixed up with accommodation for them ASAP as the OH might enjoy getting them that way.
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Speckled sussex is another nice breed and reasonably good layers. Nice, friendly birds.
We have those, some old english pheasant fowl but lnly hatched this year so no experience but they are a bit more flighty than the ss we also have a few bybrids and mixes. We got some silkie x light sussex to be used as broodies and they are excellent layers.
Good luck deciding! Lol
Helen
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We have a mixture of bhwt rehomed hens and bantams of various breeds. We also have a number of cockerals. We eat any boys we hatch out unless they are special. The best eggs we get are a cross between either hubbard or the bhwt hybrids with araucana. We get lots of large blue eggs which taste great. Just experiment for a few years and you will settle on what you like. The most cuddly and friendly and pretty are our polands and silkies but they are our worst layers (one every two days or so) but they reward you in others ways with cuddles. Our best layers are the crippled featherless hybrids that we rescue and it is very rewarding to see them grow their feathers back and get used to being pampered. Other cuddly good laying bantams are the pekins but they lay rather small eggs. Other pretty birds who are good layers are our seebrights but they are a bit flighty. Between the whole of our mob, they keep us amused and loaded with lots of eggs of different shapes, sizes and colours. Good luck deciding! You'll love em!