Читать книгу Hobby Farm Animals - Chris McLaughlin - Страница 42

There are countless varieties and hundreds of breeds from which to choose, and it’s important to pick the ones that will meet your needs. With the passage of time, humans have designed chickens to fill every niche: cold-hardy chickens, heat-resistant chickens, chickens that don’t mind being penned up. We haven’t designed the perfect chicken—yet! All breeds have certain shortcomings. Furthermore, a breed that would be a bad choice for one chicken keeper (such as hens meant to be confined who can fly out of enclosures) would be perfect for another (as free-ranging chickens, those flying hens would be able to evade dogs).

Before you can settle on the kind of chickens to buy, you need to determine what purpose they’ll serve and what environment they’ll live in. Do you want them for their eggs? Sunday dinner? Feathery companionship? Will they spend most of their time inside or out? Will they have to contend with sweltering summer days or frigid winter nights? All of these factors make a difference in your choice of breed.

Next, you must decide whether you want day-old chicks or full-grown birds, as well as how many of them to get. What advantages are there to buying a pullet rather than a chick? Is it better to start with a small flock? If you haven’t already done so, you should find out what zoning laws may apply to your keeping chickens and how they affect your decision. Do you need birds on the quiet side?

Ask yourself the following types of questions:

•Will your birds be sequestered in a chicken house, or do you favor free-range hens? Certain breeds don’t like being confined. A cramped coop of ornery Sumatras is a disaster waiting to happen, and find-your-own-feed Cochins might starve.

•How much room do you have to devote to chickens? A few bantams can thrive in a doghouse. A dozen 10-pound Jersey Giants? They’ll need a heap more space.

•Are your neighbors close by? Squawking, freedom-craving, fence-flying breeds likely won’t do. This is especially true if you live in the city or suburbs.

•Are there toddlers in your family? Testy roosters of certain breeds can injure an unwary tot.

•Do winter temperatures plummet below zero where you live? Roosters with huge single combs get frostbite easily, and some breeds simply won’t thrive in this type of weather.

•Are you in a region with hot temperatures? Fiery summer heat wilts heavy, soft-feathered breeds such as Cochins, Australorps, and Orpingtons, while other breeds take heat more in stride.

•Can you keep your top-knotted, feather-legged friends confined when the weather turns bad? Mud, slush, and fancy-feathered fowl usually don’t mix.

•Would you like to preserve a smidge of living history and raise old-fashioned or endangered breeds?

•Finally, if your chicken is a pet, will you keep it outdoors with the rest of the chickens or as a household pet?

Although we can’t tell you exactly which breed to buy, we can offer general advice and suggest birds that will meet certain criteria.

Did You Know? •The genus name for chicken-like fowl is Gallus, which means “comb.” •Insulating a rooster’s comb with a layer of petroleum jelly during extremely cold weather usually prevents freezing. •The large single combs of the hens of certain breeds flop over in a jaunty manner instead of standing up like those of roosters. •Chickens recognize some colors and are attracted to red combs. However, Silkies, Sumatras, and several varieties of game fowl have purple combs, and Sebrights’ combs are deep reddish-purple.

Chickens for Eggs or Meat

Birds with the greatest egg-laying capacity are not the same as those who plump up into the best candidates for the local chicken fry. Still different are those chickens that are the best choices for providing both eggs and meat.

If you want eggs—and a whole lot of them—Mediterranean-breed chickens are just your thing. Small, squawky, and hyperactive, these birds mature quickly, and then everything they eat goes into laying eggs. Undisputed queens of the nesting box are white Leghorns and hybrid layers based on this breed. Other impressive Mediterranean-class layers are the Minorca, Ancona, Buttercup, Andalusian, and Spanish White Face.

Some chickens from other classes are laying machines, too. The Campine (Belgium), Fayoumi (Egypt), Lakenvelder (Germany), and Hamburg (Continental Europe) are popular examples. Like their Mediterranean sisters, they tend to be flighty, specialist hens.

Meat chickens (called broilers or fryers)—usually White Cornish and White Plymouth Rock hybrids—have broad, meaty breasts and white feathers, and they mature at lightning speed. Broilers are ready for the freezer in about seven weeks, and roasters (which are just larger broilers) are ready in just three more.

Be aware that because they’re hybrids, these birds don’t breed true—meaning that their chicks won’t possess these stellar features. They also require careful handling; because of their abnormally wide breasts and rapid growth patterns, most become crippled as they mature.

Dual-purpose breeds lay fewer eggs than superlayers and mature a lot more slowly than meat hybrids, but they’re ideal all-around hobby-farm birds. They’re quieter, gentler, and friendlier than the specialists, and they’re hardy and self-reliant to boot. They are broody, so hens will set and hatch their own replacements. Nearly all lay brown eggs and are meaty enough to eat, should you wish to do so.

With a few notable exceptions, dual-purpose birds hail from the English and American classes. There are scores of interesting breeds and varieties.

Chickens as Pets

Do chickens make good pets? Absolutely! They’re smart and affectionate, and a chicken costs little to maintain. You can teach your chicken to do tricks—it’ll sit on your lap, and it may even sing if it likes you a lot. You don’t need a lot of space to keep a chicken. It won’t bark at the neighbors while you’re at work. You can raise it from a peep for just a few dollars. All in all, a chicken makes a mighty fine friend. You can even take it along when you run errands; a chicken in your car turns heads!

If pets are your pleasure, but you don’t plan to handle them, almost any sort of fowl will do. If you want pet chickens that are tame, that’s another proposition.

Some breeds are rowdy, antisocial, and just not much fun to have around; others are downright cuddly. You want to choose pets from the latter group. Silkies, Cochins, Brahmas, Naked Necks, and Belgian d’Uccles, for example, are easy to tame and make quiet, affectionate, companion chickens. Flighty Leghorns and their ilk can be tamed—but it takes a lot more time and effort.

If you’d like eggs from your pets, that narrows the equation. Not all hens lay scads of eggs. However, most young hens of the generally calm and amiable old-fashioned, dual-purpose breeds crank out one hundred to two hundred (or more) tasty brown cackleberries (eggs) a year. If a rooster fertilizes their eggs, and you allow it, most dual-purpose biddies will hatch chicks. Some ornamental breeds are friendly and lay well, too. But avoid flighty, sometimes pugnacious hybrid superlayers and breeds from the Mediterranean class. They don’t want to be your friend; they just want to lay eggs. Choose something a tad more laid back.