Looking At Poultry Breeding Pens

Breeding pens are specialized coops that helps chicken owners breed poultry correctly. During the breeding season, poultry of breeding age are picked and cooped together in the breeding pen to facilitate the correct combination of chickens that will breed strong, healthy eggs and chicks. Just like any other coop, breeding pens should be made of sturdy materials that will prevent predators from wreaking havoc with your chicken, as well as disrupt the breeding process.

When breeding there are basic rules you have to adhere to if you want to produce a good, healthy brood.  The birds should not be closely related, boost up their nutrition and separate them from the other chickens in a separate breeding pen.  When breeding, you actually have two options to help you get a good set of broods.

Best to Best

Depending on the results you want to achieve you can breed the best rooster with the best hens and heighten the odds of those traits getting passed on to the next generation. When you are selecting chickens to breed, you look at their physical traits to make a decision.  Egg laying poultry often have thin skeleton and smaller frame, they are boxier in shape and has a deep and soft tummy.  Meat types on the other hand would have thicker frames, this is so they can support thicker musculature, they will be more round in terms of shape and would have a tight tummy.  In selecting breed conformation, you will need to closely look at the physical traits of each poultry like body shape, skin color, color and pattern of the plumage as well as the shape of the comb.

Offsetting Faults

Another way to choose breeding structures is by offsetting faults, this helps in improving the breed. Remember, it is rare to have a perfect specimen, especially at the beginning but it is not ideal to have imperfections and faults to imbue the entire line. So breed those with faults to those without any, this way you can offset the fault and you will have a better chance at having chicks that doesn’t have the same fault.

Breeding season is just around the corner, make sure you get your breeding pens ready for your chickens. Get your readymade breeding pens or get your premium supplies at your friendly poultry supplies store now.