what kind of chicken to get?

[lorihadams]

Okay, I want to raise a dual purpose breed. I would like to order some straight run chicks to raise for replacements for my laying flock. I am looking to put the cockerals in the freezer as well as some of the hens if need be. I have a few breeds that I am thinking about but I want another opinion. I want to order them in the next couple of weeks along with some ducklings. I asked about this on the meat bird section of BYC but of course, everyone is saying cornish x for meat, blah. I want them to free range as much as possible and not just sit in front of a feeder and eat. I also want them to taste like chicken, if you know what I mean.

What breeds would you recommend and at what age do you slaughter them?

 

[nightshade]

orphingtons are a big bird as well as wyndottes both lay nice eggs and you could butcher your roos since they are a nice meaty bird.

 

[SKR8PN]

I talked to the folks at Meyer Hatchery. I told them I wanted a dual purpose bird and they pointed me to the New Hamshire Reds. I haven't tasted them yet, and I haven't gotten my first egg yet, but so far they are everything I was told they would be.

 

[lorihadams]

Where's Pamspride? Anyone ever eat a Black Jersey Giant?

 

[keljonma]

Lori, you may want to check with PamsPride. She raises Jersey Black Giants for eggs and meat and can give good input on that breed.

I love our JBG - not only a good egg layer (still 4 or 5 eggs a week at age 3), and a superb broody/mama hen, but very friendly and calm breed and the kids will be safe around them.

 

[Beekissed]

The NHR are as big as the Orps and are great birds, I really like mine.

For the prettiest eggs and consistent laying, Black Stars are just as big and meaty.

Orps aren't the best layers, IMO.

Brahma's are big, meaty and good layers.

When I reorder next spring, I will order some Black Stars and Freedom Rangers.

 

[user251]

are you going to keep the flock going by letting a hen hatch a clutch from time to time? the reason i ask and i dont know for sure but the black star is a hybrid it will lay like crazy but i think a black star roo and hen wont make another true black star. i personally would go for a pure breed like the rhode island red which the roos are quite large or hamp reds which are just as big being the rir was used to create the breed way back when. i have hamps myself and they are a nice heavy bird and do lay large and often with a good feed and calcium. thats just my 2 cents. good luck

 

[patandchickens]

You do NOT want Jersey Giants for meat... they mature quite slowly and feeding them up to that size is just way uneconomical compared to other breeds.

One thing to remember -- the bigger and meatier the boys are, the bigger and meatier the *girls* will be too, meaning higher feed costs on an ongoing basis for your layer flock.

Personally if I really wanted high-level economical egg production I'd get some good sexlinks straight-run and eat the cockerels (smallish) at 14-16 wks, or later I suppose if you could get the cockerels to get most of their food free-ranging. If I wanted a 'breed' rather than sexlinks, I'd either look and see what I could easily obtain that was from a particularly GOOD LAYING line of its breed and use that, be it rock or wyandotte or RIR or NHR or whatever else. And feed the cockerels up to whatever age/size seemed reasonable, given that you start putting a lot more $ per lb into them to get the last couple lbs of body size.

Seriously though, remember that the bigger birds cost more in feed for your layer flock, so it is a real tradeoff.

Good luck, have fun,

Pat, who uses Speckled Sussex for a purpose pretty close to yours, but not for any particularly important reason and plenty of other breeds would do exactly as well

 

[Wifezilla]

Here are my dual purpose birds...

Welsh Harlequin ducks.

Of course they are spoiled rotten and I am too much of a marshmallow to butcher them, but that was the original intent. Oh well....at least I will get lots of eggs soon. They will be mature in September.

 

[me&thegals]

We did this with our Silver-Laced Wyandottes and Black Australorps last year. The hens stayed in our laying flock, the boys got their own side of teh fence to eat and forage. Nine months later, we finally butchered them. My husband kept feeling them through that time to see if they were ready and we went into the butchering process convinced that we might only get 1 serving fo meat, but they actually ended up heavier than expected, may 3-4 lb?

In a side-by-side taste test with my friend's broiler chickens (before we had our own), the 2 meats were indistinguishable.

Now that we've done broilers, the roos LOOK quite scrawny. But, the taste is excellent. We just found it to be a very slow way to get meat and can't even imagine how much feed costs we must have had in them by the time we butchered. Probably we missed that magical point where continued time on earth did not really add much meat.