Making money from selling eggs and breeding chickens 

That makes a lot of sense. Nothing wrong with bringing cockerels on as table birds - that's the joy of good utility breeds - nothing wasted!

And you think we didn't learn from our mistakes...? 😂😂😂

Congratulations for so much success at such a young age! Well done :-)

Ya your like me I’m 14 and sell day old chicks.

@@Bock75 what breed do you sell???

@@rileycole8657 just regular breeds. Rhode Island Red. Barred rock. Sussex.

@@Bock75 Have you ever thought of raising rhem up and selling them as pullets you could possibly make more money

How fantastic - start them young 🙂

Thanks Lennie!

Thanks Alan. That's so kind of you to say!

That's great. Good Luck! This video might help if you're going to start breeding your chickens this year: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-h-XKVrO0_r8.html

I'm glad you found it useful 😊

You can make money sometimes

It sounds as though you have a great set up 😊

An excellent point!

Everyone looks after their chickens slightly differently and there are lots of great options, all of which work. Waving from across the ocean!

Thank you so much!

We started with cheap commercial coops and then built later. You will absolutely love keeping chickens. They are so rewarding. Have you had them before?

Goad you enjoyed it Jack

I'm glad you liked it 🙂

That's great. We wish you luck

Thank you so much 😊

We do. englishcountrylife.com/

Our pleasure! :-)

Of course! We always welcome ideas. Is there anything in particular you might want to see? I did publish a series follwoing the breeding season in 2019 that you'll find under the Breeding Chickens playlist if that's of interest but I will be doing more this year on specfic breeding subjects. I'm going to make one video on flock rotation which will include information about the roosters. To answer your question now, we do both together! To explain, we buy in fertilised eggs from another Orpington flock in autumn and use one of the broody hens to hatch them. We'll select one of males from that clutch to be the breeding the following spring. We never bring adults birds into the flock, we only ever hatch new flock members. It also helps protect our bio-security, With the coops, chickens are creatures of habit and will try to sleep in the same coop every night so if they are hatched in 1 coops, they will try and stay there. As we get to winter and and we reduce our flock to the core breeding numbers, we will consolidate coops which means closing one coops and for 3 nights o so herding those chickens into the new coop. After then, they realise where they are supposed to be. Does that help?

@@EnglishCountryLife Yes, thank you! Do you grow out the excess cockerels in a tractor or in your normal chicken enclosure?

@@amandarobertson8863 We always grow them with the main flock out in our field. Part of our driver for this lifestyle is generating food for ourselves using extremely high welfare standards. We allow the chickens to run in a wide space with lots of interesting things to keep them busy; trees coops and shelters.

@@EnglishCountryLife Thank you! I have so many questions on this topic... love to see more videos! Do you have any favorite resources on breeding and raising chickens? We have chickens but haven't gotten into breeding yet.

@@amandarobertson8863 We found it really difficult to find good information on breeding using broody hens. There are lots and lots of good informative literature on hatching using incubators and raising using artificial brooder but very little on using broody hens. You can foolow our 2019 breeding season using this link ru-vid.com/group/PLDluIIoNPsleVCZnNfB9XUJ6X0qJd4EUw

At a simple level for home consumption, no, there's no cost. If you are processing a reasonable number then a simple captive bolt stunner and processing cone is a worthwhile investment. Hugh

Good question. Chickens are creatures of habit. If you bought 10 chickens from somewhere that had kept those 10 together and you put them into 5 coops with 2 in each, most likely all or most of them will try and crowd into 1 coop the next night. Only the lowest on the pecking order might try and sleep in another coop. If you put the 10 chickens in 5 coops with runs with 2 in each coop and didn't let them out of the run for a week, after that week it's most likely that they'll stay in the 5 coops. Does that help?

Unfortunately where we live there is no market. We live in a rural community where there is no shortage of chickens, cattle and horses all producing good manure.

In the UK as at Oct 2020 you must register with the Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA) if you keep 50 or more birds (for any purpose or any breed I.e. chickens, geese, ducks) at any 1 time. There is also a legal requirement to register as a hatchery or breeding site if you have a capacity for 1000 eggs or more or have breeding birds of 100 or more. There are rules around selling eggs for human consumption however if you don't meet either of the APHA registration criterias above you can advertise selling hatching eggs and live chickens for sale within the UK without filling paperwork tracking stock.

😁

Pure breed chickens do sell for a good value in the UK. It;s not just Orpintons but other breeds too. A basic hybrid egg-layer will retail for around 15-20GBP so 35-40 for a pure breed is not unreasonable. There is not a pedigree/registration but our buyers have had show winners with our stock bloodlines so we never have problems with sales. I had 2 for sale last week and had 4 offers at full ask within 2 hours. To be fair it's taken time to build that reputation.

Thanks! 🤣🤣🤣

3 times a day is an absolute minimum. Our incubator turns every 30 minutes and broody hens do it every hour. Mark the eggs on 2 sides so you can be sure that you turn them all.

Attilio, if they are allowed to graze on any green growing material they will get rich orange yolks from the plant material. I believe Calendula can add colour, but the flavour will not of course be as good.

@@EnglishCountryLife Thank you very much! you're channel is awsome

@@attiliofrabetti8023 Thank you!

Yes indeed!

Hi, worming is easily accomplished by chicken keepers we cover it here ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-0VFIFHs4-2A.html

There are regulations but, if you gave fewer than 50 hens & only sell "at the gate" they are not too onerous. This is a good view of the regulations www.inbrief.co.uk/agricultural-law/sale-of-eggs/

I really appreciate you saying that you like the videos. When we have excess hens from breeding them we do sometimes sell them in late autumn. Unfortunately it's unlike we'll have any to sell this year - sorry. 😟

@@EnglishCountryLife Thank you for the quick reply. No problem at all. Was i right about location? ;) Watched all your chicken related video's tonight. Look forward to the next one. Thanks again for sharing your knowledge with us all.

@@dccarpetcleaningserviceuk86 Hi yes, we are South Lincolnshire 😀 If you are still interested later in the year drop us a note again just in case we do have any hens available.

@@EnglishCountryLife That's Great, Thank you. You are only 2 miles from me. Regards Wayne

We sell a few cockerels to other breeders but most we raise to full grown size and then they become table birds.

@@EnglishCountryLife thanks for your reply !! Is there a specific breed that would be ok? As when reading online it says many people don’t eat the roosters due to them tasting differently Etc ?

@@yusuufibrahim530 We don't find that they taste markedly different to be honest. There are many dual purpose breeds, but we like Buff Orpingtons and Brahmas

@@EnglishCountryLife thanks so much for the amazing information :-) speaking with different people they was saying the males taste different due to the Testerone etc what breed would you recommend to be the most sort after would it be light Sussex for eggs and meat ?

@@yusuufibrahim530 We only produce eggs and meat for our own use so wouldn't be able to advise you what would be preferred commercially

Seems like a sensible question to us John. In chicks it can be impossible until they start to mature ( although some breeds, known as "autosexing" have different feather patterns for male and female chicks)

In adult chickens, the cocks have much more pronounced combs ( the red on top of the head) and wattles ( the red under the chin). They usually are larger and have a collar of long thin feathers around the neck and shoulders. The tail is larger and curls over.

If you watch this video, you will see examples of cockerels and hens to illustrate the explanation ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-aop_G9uzOVA.html

Hi Edie. We get ours from Ebay, but they are fairly common here, most sellers of fertilised eggs use them www.ebay.co.uk/itm/10-X-6-HOLE-MEDIUM-POLYSTYRENE-EGG-BOXES-HATCHING-INCUBATION-CHICKEN/183980252002?hash=item2ad613db62:g:LPgAAOSwhtNehzPN Regards, Hugh

English Country Life thank you so much. I will check ebay. I am very glad your channel was recommended to me. I have binge watched since yesterday. Thank you for all your recommendations for Buff Orpingtons. I love them so much. 🐥

3 & 6 is correct, hens don't lay for twelve months of the year. They go off lay when moulting and again if they brood. Hope that helps 🙂

@@EnglishCountryLife Ah I understand. I'm in Florida and they lay year round here.

@@forced4motorsports Even when moulting 😳

@@EnglishCountryLife They don't all molt at the same time.

@@forced4motorsports Interesting - we have very defined periods of moult in the Autumn

If you have a cockerel, it's not guaranted that the eggs will be fertlised. The cockerel may mount only some of the hens and not all of them, his aim may be off, of his fertility may be low. For your 2nd question, provided a broody hen hasn't begun to incubate the eggs, fertilised eggs are perfectly OK to eat :-) Does that help?

That's exactly what we do.

You have a very good point there.

Hi, sorry we don't send eggs abroad, they don't survive the postage

Its never caused us a problem & we've used it, literally, hundreds of times.

Good idea! I have the same concerns, because I've learned that Sharpie marker ink goes right through the eggshell from writing on a hard-boiled egg (it stains the egg white). I thought of dipping the top of the eggs in some natural food coloring, and having a little jar of it for the purpose. On the go, I might have used an ink pad or filled an empty ink marker with a natural plant food coloring. But a crayon would be convenient and easier to carry around the farm! It's nontoxic and nonreactive, safe for children and chickens, and wouldn't penetrate through the shell at all, which is ideal. It wouldn't affect the chicks and even if the chickens eat the eggshell, it's just wax. Perhaps I could use a beeswax crayon, better to eat than paraffin wax. It wouldn't be hard to make a crayon if I can't find an inexpensive one to buy! Just a stick of beeswax that's been melted and had coloring mixed in, and maybe something to dilute it if necessary to make it harder or softer for the purpose of writing on delicate eggshells. A tiny bit of olive oil could soften it easily, I often make a lip balm of food-grade beeswax and extra virgin olive oil. Too much and it will be too greasy and not a crayon, but it would be easy to experiment a little at a time.

@@EnglishCountryLife : Yet, some chemicals accumulate within fatty tissue over months and years before presenting any symptoms. Mercury, Lead, Cadmium, Aluminum to name a few metals, not to mention other chemical compounds, such as toluene, glycols, and so on. Eggshells are permeable. I wouldn’t buy an egg with marker ink on it. But, that’s just me.

@@Skashoon However once the chick hatches, there is no source from which it can accumulate. As we said, experience proves that it's not an issue, but if it concerns you, by all means don't do it.

I have seen collars but we have chosen to keep the chickens in as natural a way as possible. If it prevented injury or enhanced their lives we might use a collar but the collar adds a physical restriction to their vocal ability and neck movements so we choose not to use them.

I'm sorry we don't, air travel in hold cargo has a bad effect on their viability

@@EnglishCountryLife Mam, what about 6 months old breeders international cargo?

220 is an average and relates to pure breeds. I suspect you have a modern hybrid which were designed to be an egg laying machine so have much higher lay rates. Hybrids are very popular for people wanting hens for eggs and in that case you have made a good choice. For this video I needed to deal in averages and anyone choosing to get hens could choose a breed which lays far less than 220 e.g. our Old English Pheasant Fowl that only lay around 160 eggs a year, or could choose a breed like Golden Comet that lays 330 eggs per year or even your modern hybrids that can lay more. Once the breed has been identified you can adapt the illustrations using the calculations on the slides 👍

@@EnglishCountryLife ya but if you were selling eggs for profit you would probably pick the best layers. Great content by the way

@@Bock75 Thank you and yes, you're right if you are only choosing to sell eggs for eating a modern hybrid which lays huge amounts for a limited lifespan is by far the best choice. I was trying to illustrate the ability to use 3 routes to sell. Fertilised eggs and pol hens from pure breeds are in high demand but less so (but still popular) from hybrids. Pure breeds lay far less eggs per annum but their egg laying lifespan is longer too. If you want your hen to produce new hens for sale or fertilised eggs pure breed hens and fertilised eggs will normally sell for double the price of a hybrid equivalent. It does go back to what you would like your hen to do for you and its about choosing the breed that meets that need. Absolutely you have made the right choice to provide you with eating eggs 👍

I'm not sure? Where in the video is the word?

@@EnglishCountryLife well U said per anam.

I understand. "Per annum" means "each year". Sorry. Hugh