Should You Raise Heritage Chicken Breeds?

Reader Contribution by Anna Twitto
Published on November 1, 2017
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Though all chickens are descended from the red junglefowl (Gallus gallus), in the course of human history different climate and selective breeding have produced a vast selection of shapes, sizes and colors in this most common domestic fowl. All chickens can interbreed, however, and hybrids can work just fine in terms of egg production, meat production, pest control, hardiness and attractiveness. So why should one invest in a heritage breed, bearing in mind the initial higher cost of the stock?

By raising heritage breeds, we connect ourselves with the history of humankind and farming, and preserve the unique beauty of a breed that had been developed by hundreds of years of targeted selection – though there are also some new breeds, the age of which is measured in decades.

Predictability – unlike hybrids, pure-bred heritage chickens breed true. If you start with a flock of, say, Wyandottes, a few years down the road you will still have a flock of Wyandottes, with largely the same qualities of egg production, growth rates, adaptation to climate, and appearance (though you can improve your flock by hatching eggs from your finest, best-looking, hardiest specimens). With mutt chickens, you can always expect surprises.

Profit – apart from the initial cost of purchasing your purebred flock and/or hatching eggs, it doesn’t cost more to raise heritage breeds; you provide the same food, housing, care, etc, for any chicken. On the other hand, if you have some extra chicks or pullets for sale – and if you plan on breeding your flock at all, you will almost certainly have extra stock in the course of time – people will be ready to give you a better price for purebred stock than for mutts.

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