Good chicken varities?

[ottawagardener]

Did you use the img code tags?

[honeydew]

I have had Rhode Island Reds, Buff Orphingtons, Ameraucanas and Blue Andalusians.

Funny enough, I didn't like the RIRs at all. I found them squacky and aggressive to my others, especially the Ameraucanas. I liked the eggs they laid though. But at the end of the day, we got rid of those ones. Bear in mind I can't stand certain noises. Squacking is one of them.

I love the Buff Orphingtons because they more like sing to you. They are quieter and even though they are very chatty, and a couple of them make a point of coming right up to me and chatting away when I go out there, they do not hurt the ears. They are also very pretty, and cold hardy. They are really broody. Our BO rooster is pretty nice and tame.

Blue Andalusians have great tasting white eggs! Yum. They seem to be a bit flightier. Our rooster has such a large comb & wattles that he froze some of it off, so I'm going to assume that they are not as great in the colder climates. I don't think I can even remember a time when I have seen one of the BA hens sitting on eggs. But they are good consistent layers. The rooster doesn't really seem to interested in the hens or his "job" with them. Hmm.

The Ameraucanas are in between with the broodiness. They lay these pastel green, occasionally close to blue eggs which are harder shelled. The taste is strong, and not preferred in our family, so we tend to use those ones for recipes. The yolks are really dark yellow. We had roosters from this breed, but we found them really aggressive with the ladies. It was too much for the hens, so we got rid of them.

[baby daddy]

Jan 1, 2011 9:45:40 GMT -5 ottawagardener said:

Did you use the img code tags?

Ya I did, Joseph sent me an email , and I think I know what I was doing wrong now. Thanx for the help Telsing...
and Joseph....

[flowerpower]

The lady who used to live in my house had over 300 chickens. I guess some were Ameraucana. She gave one of the neighbors green eggs. The color was a total turn off to him. He wouldn't eat them & threw them all away. lol People around here want brown or white. Green or blue eggs are just way to weird.

[extremegardener]

We had a small mixed flock years ago. The breed that was a standout for us was Light Brahma - large dual purpose, pea comb and foot feathers, so well adapted to long cold winters . The temperament was relatively nice and mellow, which I appreciated compared to the other breeds. The LBs were amenable to being picked up and handled, which counts for a lot for me with critters.

[flowerpower]

I've heard that the Brahmas are sweet birds. I have a small mixed flock. 8 GL Wyandottes, 6 Golden Comets, 1 Barred Rock and 1 Maran.

5 of the Golden Comets I rescued this past summer. They had been neglected and almost starved to death. Their beaks have been cut by someone who was clueless. I was surprised that 2 of them could even eat a pellet. The girl I got them from said she cried when she got them. The birds couldn't even stand up. She did an excellent job with them, but had no room to keep them. They still don't look great in my opinion.

[gallorojo]

We have raised a lot of poultry breeds over the years, and have learned a lot about what works and what does not. I wanted to post a bit about my favorite breed, the Cubalaya. I personally am NOT a big fan of the dual purpose breeds , I have posted this elsewhere, but, it seems some of it may be valuable to all of you here. We were looking for an ideal homesteaders type of chicken, with these critera- Calm temperament, no genetic health problems, normal feathering, excellent broodies, roosters protective, decent layers, but will not lay in winter, pea comb, clean legs, slower growth rate, good foragers, good at avoiding predators. The only breeds that fit were Buckeyes, Ameraucanas, and Cubalayas. We love the Cubalayas, and are trialing the Ameraucanas currently. Below is my case for the Cubalayas.

I wanted to take a few minutes to make my case for why this a great breed. In my opinion, this is THE IDEAL "homesteader's" chicken breed. Why? Let me list off the reasons!!

1) Foraging ability- they are the best foragers of any breed we have had, they FAR SURPASS any American or European Dual purpose breeds, which just get fat and lazy and hang around the feeders. The Cubalayas will roam literally 5 -10 times farther away than any other breeds we have had, except some mixed breed bantams.

2) Predator avoidance- they are good at avoiding becoming dinner themselves, very, very fast, alert, good flyers, agile. We never lose adults, sometimes, a small chick, but never any adults. The males WILL defend their flock, I have seen therm attack hawks, cats, and dogs, and WIN.

3) Very hardy- neither cold nor heat really bothers them, I can't say the same for the fat, panting, dual purpose fatties. I have never had any get sick, get mites, anything like that. I have never even seen them suffer at all in heat or cold, and we have lost other types of chickens in both extreme heat and cold before.

4)Amazing brooders- the best broodies I've ever had, they all, 100%, go broody at least once a year, often twice, and go broody the first year. They never poop the nest, attack chicks, abandon chicks, anything like that. I have never had cocks bother sitting hens, or bother even newly hatched chicks. They will brood chicks for months, trying to cover huge nearly full grown chicks at night. They will easily tolerate moving to a broody coop to set, and they are DEDICATED, I have had them hatch muscovy eggs.

5)Great temperaments- they are wonderful, pleasant birds!! Very friendly, curious, NOT AT ALL NOISY OR FLIGHTY!!! Very relaxed around people, they don't scream when picked up, or even when they are going to the knife, they have courage and stay calm. They are also the most intelligent chickens I have had, they can figure out things that seem beyond other chickens. They are NOT "game", the cocks can be more aggressive than some breeds, for sure, but, they are not "homicidal maniacs". I have the greatest respect for gamefowl and the breeders of them, but, I am looking for the ideal, sustainable, low-input chicken, and the games, although fantastic in many ways, would need more input from me to keep them from killing each other. The cubalayas are the best choice I can find for temperament without being "dead game".

6) Slow growers, and normal layers- So, why do I list these 2 as positives? A fast growing bird will need more food, and better food, to maintain growth and be healthy. My goal is to eventually produce all my own feed, so, most of the birds feed has to come from their own efforts. I don't see fast growing birds as well suited to that, they are more well suited to be fed heaps of grain, with foraging as more of a vitamin supplement. I have friends from Mexico, Laos, and Zambia, there are no bagged chicken feeds there, yet, everyone has chickens , and somehow they survive. Also, the normal layers comment-they lay in spring thru fall, and STOP in the winter. This is great!! There is no food to forage here in the winter, and no market for eggs then, so, why should they even lay? I sell pastured eggs, well, in the winter, they sure are not pastured, so, I can't honestly sell them as such, plus , the market I sell them at is closed. So, what do I do with all the dual purpose breeds who stupidly lay eggs all winter? I'm in the process of phasing them all out, in favor of birds that lay when the grass is green, and quit in the winter.

7) Finally, they are BEAUTIFUL!!! Hard to beat such elegant, graceful fowl. Why should productive livestock not also be beautiful to watch?

I feel strongly these are a much better choice for people just looking to put eggs and meat on the table in a sustainable way, than any dual purpose breed ever will be. No, these are not super productive, BUT, they are very low input, which, it seems to me is way better if you primarily want eggs and meat for your own family, for the least work, time, cost, and hassle. And they are beautiful, with great personality!!

[Alan]

Wow, thanks for the review! Now you've got me interested and I'd mostly already lost interest in chickens here on the farm thanks to my other game birds.

They are beautiful as pictured above. I do prefer gamey type chickens, even if they don't produce as much meat, as long as there is a bit of breast and leg meat, I'm satisfied.

I'd be interested in using them crossed over to Brahma and English Game, maybe even Fan Tail, just to find a good barn roosting mutt that could fend for itself.

Hell, if they are half of what your review states, I might just be interested in them alone as my chicken needs match your review to a T.

[mnjrutherford]

We slaughtered our 4 Cornish X cocks last Sunday. The SMALLEST was 10 lbs AFTER it was dressed! The skin was tough as leather and we had a heck of a time getting them gutted because of it. These birds were only 7 months old to boot! I have an 8 gallon pot and filled to the brim, a portion of a leg still stuck out. I simmered that fella all night with nothing but salt and thyme, mainly because nothing else would fit! The next morning, I took it off heat and allowed it to cool a couple hours, pulled the meat out and set it aside and let the broth cool a bit longer. I bagged up 12 quarts of excellent broth and at least a couple of pounds of meat. I made chicken salad that we have been munching on for snacks. I used some of the broth for rice last night. Tonight I think I'm making chicken noodle soup. We'll be eating this bird a long time and it's pretty darn tasty!

[garnetmoth]

The Cubalayas do sound awesome. We have a city yard and do better with more sedentary birds for their own good. We got a nice sturdy coop built, and will make a run in the yard for them .

Jo- sounds awesome. Im a food safety spaz so I would encourage everything into the fridge or freezer within 2 hrs just to be super safe- you can pour the stock into smaller containers to cool faster, and even add ice if needed.

[synergy]

I can vouch for Buff Orphingtons being very sweet, quiet easy to manage birds and they reliably lay medium size eggs.

[mnjrutherford]

Feb 11, 2011 15:43:15 GMT -5 garnetmoth said:

Jo- sounds awesome. Im a food safety spaz so I would encourage everything into the fridge or freezer within 2 hrs just to be super safe- you can pour the stock into smaller containers to cool faster, and even add ice if needed.

It took far more than two hours just to get the birds processed. Maybe 3 hours? Anyhow, I've discovered that there isn't as much need to be that careful as some might have you think. Particularly when you are working with something that is really hot, like the soup. If you put a few gallons of something really hot in a freezer, you'll actually bring down the freezer temps enough to allow bacteria to grow. The time line of the process ran like this:

3 hrs (give or take a few minutes) - slaughter, gut, and clean
30 minutes bag up 3 birds and put 4th bird into the soup pot with salt & thyme.
At this point, the bagged birds went into the freezer
30 minutes bring cooking bird up to temp, gentle simmer
The bird was in that pot until early morning.
Pull the meat out of the water and into a bowl to cool
Pull cooking pot to cool spot in the kitchen to cool
30 minutes after pulling out the meat, you can handle it, pull the meat off the bone and bag. Some to freezer, some to fridge for use later that night.
1 hour after pulling the soup pot off heat, it's cooled down enough that it can be safely handled as well so I portioned it into quart bags and lay them flat on a cookie sheet. Laying them flat allows them to freeze faster.

The only way to really speed up the process would be to have more human bodies attached to eager working hands. Which means that the next time we kill chickens, we need to send you a plane ticket, right! ;D

[garnetmoth]

I got a 98% on my food safety certification. I just need to type things out sometimes. I dont doubt you are working diligently!

I think adding a plane ticket would ruin the economy of growing your own food ;-) and when we processed, we just skinned. VERY easy. Id learn plucking but skinning is easy.

Synergy- Orps are pretty. the hatchery near us has them, but Ive read they are on the broody side. I DO admit city backyard chickens temperaments need to be a bit different than an ideal homestead bird.

[mnjrutherford]

I've been thinking about this since that last post. Don't get me wrong, food safety is of paramount importance. After all, when we, as a nation "talk" about keeping ourselves safe from foreign attack we look at our food systems. I've pondered this very thing myself on many occasions. If I wanted someone dead, they would be gone in 30 minutes or less and I wouldn't even need any special ingredients. It's all about food handling and storage, just as you point out.

However, I do think that over emphasis is being put in the wrong places. Joel Salatin, I believe, once did a test of this theory comparing the bacterial contamination levels of his open air processed poultry to the closed "USDA approved" systems. Mr. Salatin's poultry was "cleaner" than the poultry from the USDA inspected and approved facility. I think I saw this in the movie "Food Inc."

Obviously, there is a lot more to it than this. But the science is beyond me. What I can say is that we often eat things left out overnight... we are famous for doing this to pizza, and we don't get sick from it. Ever. On the other hand, my husband tells me that he frequently suffered from sever intestinal distress from food his mother prepared. The difference? She used a lot of poor quality food and her kitchen was not sanitary.

In point of fact, since removing our boys from public school, the closest we've been to "sick" is when the pines are releasing pollen. Even that is not debilitating. When the kids were in school, they were stuffy, headachy, coughing, and sneezing by the end of the first week and we followed suit by the end of the second week and we stayed that way till a month following the end of school. Throughout the year there were several occasions when we were to bad off to get out of bed.

So, I kinda feel that some of the things we are told are more alarmist than need be and in some cases, not even backed up by good science. After all, back in the 40s a group of extremely prestigious physicians decided that a woman's breasts were a completely inadequate source of human infant nourishment. The negative consequences of that pronouncement are reverberated around the world to this very day.

[mnjrutherford]

Feb 12, 2011 11:02:26 GMT -5 garnetmoth said:

I think adding a plane ticket would ruin the economy of growing your own food ;-) and when we processed, we just skinned. VERY easy. Id learn plucking but skinning is easy.

Ahh but the companionship would be so very worth the price! Skinning is fine and dandy, but the skin has a lot of flavor and nourishment. So, I recommend learning the hard way also!