Poultry Talk Ontario (pto.ca)

I know everybody is poised with spread sheet in hand, planning for this year flock increases,
So, how many of what - Breed/variety/ are you planning to HATCH.....PURCHASE........ SELL...... and most importantly keep for yourself????
This is a bit of a reality check for me, perhaps if I write it down, I will stick to it.
Planning on 2 incubator (Hova) runs, Wyandottes and Ameraucanas combined.
That should give me about 60 chicks, 30 cockerels for the freezer (she said optimistically)
12 pullets for replacement and Ha Ha Ha apparently I will have 18 pullets to sell??
So why does that never happen?????
Oh wait, it will be 40 cockerels for the freezer and 8 pullets to sell, that sounds much more realistic.

well id like to do 200 reds. 50 beltsvilles and raise my jumbo quail numbers up to about 50 breeders in order to produce a lot more. what am I guna do with them? hmmm good question. well I just bought 100 poultry fingers and will be building a drum plucker very soon. so a lot of my current birds, mainly the mutts are going to be put in the freezer and I need to decide what other breeds I truly want to work with... LB and B leghorn, black copper maran, bbs Ameraucana. some of my birds have just started laying again!!! WOOOHOOO!

I'm going to hatch Buckeyes, dark cornish , Anconas, and some of my barnyard crosses . Haven't figured out how many, it will depend on how many eggs hatch, but I'm hoping for 4 dozen Buckeye hatching eggs from Alberta in the hopes of ending up with 2 decent cockerels and 6 decent pullets. I'm working on getting Buckeyes from other sources and would like to maintain a breeding flock of 3 roosters and 15 hens.

oh dear. i figure i need to hatch at least 100 each of my welbars and rhodebars to select my final breeders.
i need to find a blue wheaten ameraucana cockerel to replace my wheaten boy and then hatch out some blue wheaten, so probably another 20 there, and then about 10 on each line just to select future breeders to hold the lines. anything not used in the lines will be sold or freezer camped. i want to concentrate on the black tailed buffs, wheaten marans, black gold ameraucana, rhodebars and welbars (both silver and gold) this year. i'm going to off load the EOs and white leghorn breeder lines, and then not replace any layers that are really old....once they go my lines will become my "layers" as well. i need to hatch out at least 40 dark cornish as well, for the chef's project. yeah, and my new years resolution was to downsize a bit....HA!

I'm gonna eat more chicken & quail . Hint Hint . Lol
Luck

Well my largest and closest to show quality Cochin hen is four years old, and I finally found a decent rooster, plus she is laying without any lighting. That means I am already collecting eggs from her, because everyone on this site knows any day now a t-rex will probably appear, knock down the barn and specifically eat her before spring, thus I need to get chicks asap.

Skinny rooster wrote:Well my largest and closest to show quality Cochin hen is four years old, and I finally found a decent rooster, plus she is laying without any lighting. That means I am already collecting eggs from her, because everyone on this site knows any day now a t-rex will probably appear, knock down the barn and specifically eat her before spring, thus I need to get chicks asap.

Too true. I'm not sure why life has to be so cruel. Good idea to start collecting eggs, I think .

Seriously , ouch , keep breeding the same banty pure Hamburgs & chanties I have & crossing some for egg layers /easy keepers , watching them wander all over yard & eatin bugs. . #1 will be picking out a new show breed of pigeon to work with . Either of these 2 breeds .

Oh man I don't even want to think about this...

Not sure how many I will keep, but plan on keeping a few hens or each breed to raise as replacements, raise a bunch of roos to eat and hopefully sell a few chicks.

BC Marans - buying 2 dozen hatching eggs plus will hatch out a few of my own eggs - goal 30 chicks
Bielefelders- buying 18 hatching eggs plus hatch out a few of my own eggs - goal 20 chicks
Cream Legbars- goal to hatch 20 chicks
Light Brahmas - goal to hatch 15 chicks
Houdans - buying 12 hatching eggs plus hatch a few of my own - goal 10 chicks
Olive Eggers - hatch 10
Red Sex-linked - hatch 15
Blck Sex-linked - hatch 15

Serama Bantams - hatch 10

Beltsville Small White Turkeys - hatch 25 poults
Artisan Gold Turkeys - hatch 10 poults
BSW x Artisan Gold turkeys - hatch 10 poults

Jumbo/TAM Quail - hatch 150+ to increase breeding stock and put 100 in freezer
Guinea Fowl - buy/hatch 30 keets
Chukar Partridge - hatch 20?
Blue Scale Quail - hatch as many as possible, only have 1 pair.

No idea if I will even get close to my hatching goals or go way over them, time will tell.

JimW

Ross I vote for the Voorburg, looked them up in my Encyclopedia of pigeon breeds by Wendell M. Levi, where I get my pigeon fix since I can't keep pigeons. Beauties.
JimW, I think the Eastern Ontario summer picnic should be held at your place, when we could all judge the results of your ambitious plans. that way if you have some excess, we can all take few home to help achieve more even distribution over the countryside.