Episode-2733- The Case for Bantam Chickens
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I put out a little video yesterday about the progress of our Bantam Chickens at Nine Mile Farm. I just love the personality of these pint sized chickens and they are coming along nicely. Someone asked this question in the comments section…
Why bantams and not full size chickens? They are small and lay small eggs. I would think that they would be best for someone with limited space?
It is a totally reasonable question. There are really two angles in it though. One is some reality, they do lay smaller eggs and they are good for someone with limited space and my space is not really limited. The other angle though is a lack of understanding of the inherent value of these smaller birds beyond hiding a small flock from HOA Karen and her ilk. They just have a LOT going for them.
This made me realize that while I have talked about bantams in shows in the past I have never done an episode dedicated to them. Really 2700 plus episodes over 12 years and the little chickens have never gotten one dedicated to them, well let’s fix that today.
Join Me Today to Discuss
- Let’s start with how livestock collides with lifestyle design, all choices have positives and negatives
- Positives
- Fun and entertainment
- Food production
- Waste processing
- Potential Income
- Negatives
- Input expense and sourcing
- Husbandry requires time
- Makes travel harder
- Impact on your land
- Impact on neighbors
- Cold and hot weather concerns
- The beauty of bantams
- Great personalities (rooster complex issues though)
- Small eggs cook really nicely
- Two eggs make one egg for larger needs
- You can have more, hence greater is the “two is one, one is none”
- Very happy with coop and run arrangements
- Very suited to being let out in the evening only from coop and run
- Happy to process waste
- Lots of income potential though not like you think
- Broody
- Well suited to partial automation of care
- The down side
- Culls are small for meat production
- Not that aggressive with waste processing
- Can be more subject to predators (especially hawks)
- Become pet like, makes culling harder
- Some thoughts I have on having a good experience
- Infrastructure first
- Don’t become a collector (at least not in the first season)
- Design the system into your life and property
- Enjoy them for what they are, often better than TV
- Don’t put them on lights for higher production
- Come up with an egg storage plan
- Final Thoughts – They are one of the easiest of all critters to care for.
- Positives
Resources for today’s show…
- Follow Life With Jack on Instagram
- Parley with Me – It’s Pretty Awesome Really
- TSP Facebook Group
- Join the Members Brigade
- Join Our Forum
- Walking To Freedom
- TspAz.com
- 40 Hour Week – Alabama
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Has “egg glassing” ever been covered on TSP? I searched and found nothing. I’m interested in glassing eggs for egg preservation but it seems strange. Does anyone have experience with egg glassing? Thank you.
Logan, check out TOWSENDS website – he has a whole and very nice vid on egg preservation as our ancestors did it. The best way may be limeing. “Glassing” usually refers to the use of sodium silicate solution, also referred to as “water glass”. The idea of the various methods is to give the shell extra protection from air and microbes. The egg shells are basically lime.
Bantams are lots of fun and a lot less work in my opinion. And I never thought about them as escaping the attention of Screaming Karen. Good! You covered the topic very well. They are quite bright and clever. In certain situations they will hide their eggs. I went out one day to find a bantam hen with a string of little bumblebees scurrying behind her. What the heck? Where did they come from?
2 to 1 bantam eggs to standard eggs is very helpful.
Unfortunately I haven’t ever found any specific information regarding eggs per year for any bantam breeds.
I’m on board on all the other points, it’s just the total eggs per year per bird that has me about to buy sex link again for this next round of birds. (Yes the hatchery eggs/year can be optimistic to a fault, but at least it’s a starting point for running numbers)
I even like the idea of bantams being “two is one” because of the predator arguments.
But I am looking for a dozen standard eggs a day. (I eat six a day by myself so using a dozen a day is indeed realistic)
If the bantams have the same average numbers as the full size, then I can just double the number of birds. But if they only average two thirds of the output of a full size sex link, then simply doubling the number of birds wouldn’t meet my needs.
Thoughts?
Is there a sex-link bantam?
If sex links are rooster A with hen B and both breeds also come in bantam (or “miniature” if you want to differentiate between true bantams and miniatures), then there should be sex link bantams right?
I have four acres so the size differences are less of an argument in either direction. Just a matter of eggs per year.
Thanks always to Jack and the rest of the folks that make this community so great.
Da Li
You are likely better off with standard birds. You are also going to need to cull frequently to keep production up that high. Any chicken is born with 1000 eggs, they can’t make any more. Every round fired is a round expired, no reloads.
Production reds can produce 300+ in year one, that is 30% gone. Most commercial facilities cull them at 18 months because they tend to start making eggs that look a bit funny in the second production year, but they are fine to eat. They will give you another 250-300 in year two.
Once you go over 50% of eggs laid, production will drop in half after the next molt so 150 and you can expect it to drop in half in year 4, 70ish.
This is why I like ducks of regular breeds that do 160-200 a year. They start with 1500 ovum. They will in general hit 50% at about the 5th year. Yea there are ducks that are high producers 250-300 but they tend to flame out about the 4th year hard. They also do not look healthy by that time.