AUSTRALIAN POULTRY FORUM™

Thanks Jo - again I appreciate your thoughts ..
"Chloe" is walking on her leg to get to her food and water .. but still v. much limping. I am hoping with some rest in the pen s/he should be okay! I am just making sure she has food and water right by her ...
I will definitely be looking to get some laying hens, so will look into a RIR cross perhaps. A local poultry farm sells Hy-lines ... Do you know what they are? Supposedly bred very much for laying .. I always wanted "authentic" chickens though if you know what I mean as we can only really hav ea few where we are... Hence the search for a RIR. I know a lady who has some Ancona pullets for sale (8 weeks old) - what are your thoughts on that breed? I was some good layers but also a nice, pretty, friendly bird as well. We have 2 bantams (hens) also - a partridge wyandotte and a yellow pekin.
I will try and take a video of "Chloe" and email it to you.
Thanks again,
Lorelei

Hy-lines are basically the same idea as isa brown, lay alot first few years of their lives (every day), then at about two years of life they only lay occasional eggs and can drop dead from 4 years on wards. We've moved alot in the last few years and when we have enough space I always breed a cross like isa (or hyline) crossed with RIR or Wyndotte or Leghorn or a breed like that because then you get a strong bird who is very hardy (isas etc are not very hardy) who lays very well (perhaps not every single day) and for a long time - so you don't end up feeding a bird for years and years when they stopped laying years ago. I used to breed Isa x RIR because they were also nice and placid, more so than the Leghorn x, I would suggest to people that if they wanted layers then buy one in the autumn and one in the spring, or half and half so that you have some laying in teh winter and some laying in the summer (idea being you get eggs all year round). Anyway I know that space is prbably limited and so the Hyline's would be fine if they are point-of-lay, just be prepared to have hens that may give up laying in a few years.


Ancona's are pretty little things and are meant to be very good layers. I have only ever had one and she never laid an egg, but I think she was around 3 years old. I tried everything, but obviously that is why the breeder sold her. I must say Point of lay or even 8 weeks old is good too, just means you have to feed them for a couple of months before they start to lay, but that's no problem. DO NOT GET OLD HENS, be very careful of 1st year hens as unless they are from a poultry farm they could be 3rd year hens and it would be difficult to tell at times, and soem breeders are not very honest I have found.

If you do have room for one rooster get a hyline hen and a RIR bantam rooster and put him over your hyline and wyandotte, you'll get some lovely little females from that cross and excellent layers too...

Anyway hope this helps

jo-chicken

Thanks so much Jo - I really have appreciated all of your advice! Lovely to find this forum and some expert help!

I have some hylines which were adopted form a barn style egg farm.
I love them.
lovely and quiet and friendly birds.
ecconomical as each bird only requires 115g of laying pellets a day.

Just an update ... took my 2 boys back to the breeder who said she would have them back ... To be honest I think she may have known they were boys when she sold them to me as a "novice". My boy (aka Chloe) with the "limp" actually turned out to have a sore neck / vertebrae and it was his inability to balance that made me think it was a limp. Poor guy!

Thankfully I have found a lovely breeder here in WA who "guarantees" the sex of her chickens. If for some reason she gets it wrong you can take your rooster back and she will refund you or exchange them ... (please PM if you are in WA and are looking for a breeder of various kinds - I will send you her contact details). She had sold out of many or her larger breeds (I don't have a huge amount of space and already have a partridge wyandotte bantam and a buff pekin bantam), but was able to find me 3 gorgeous gold lace wyandotte hens - who are so quiet and beautiful. My 4 year old son has taken over naming rights on these ones so we have Mrs Scoop, Mrs Lofty and Mrs Dizzy (Bob the Builder has a big influence obviously!) ... Anyway we are all very excited about our little group of 5. A mixed bunch but all very pretty in their own ways!

We still probably have room for 2 or 3 more in the future ... so will keep you posted on our next breed!

Thanks to you all for your advice .... have really appreciated this forum and its band of experts!

Glad to hear it all worked out, its a shame as RIR's are an excellent breed, as are the wyandottes,
Great names

Peter

Can you tell me what an Isa Brown is. You mentioned it in your post to Lorelie re: RIR's questions about Clementine and Chloe.
All mine are Rhode Island Reds and probably X for all I know. They are lovely chooks - very placid and quite entertaining at times. They lay nice size eggs to. We were getting 7 or 8 eggs a day from 9 girls just before going on holidays but since we have got back they have dropped to about 3-5 per day - we think because of the very hot weather and then now all the rain up here in North Qld.
Cheers!
Margie

an Isa Browns is a cross bred hen which has been specially bred for egg production,
im pretty sure thats what they are.

Peter

Hey Margie,
forgot to add this link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISA_Brown
it has a bit of info on the isa brown

Peter

That's really an interesting link. Actually, those chicken pics in the Wikipedia (of ISA Browns) look very similar to mine. Some of my RIRs have yellow legs and feet and some of them have the pearly-white color skin and legs. Aren't RIR's typically yellow skinned and yellow leg coloured?
Cheers,
Margie