Hello Everyone, so I had a number of exotic chickens at the farm including the huge Brahma/Cochin, Silkie and Polish chickens. I would usually allow local chickens to incubate their eggs, as these exotic breeds are not always broody. Around September last year, I sold them off and I absent-mindedly left the local chickens free-ranging around in the farm. Long story short, within a few months, my local chickens went from under 10 to over a 100. So I would occasionally buy feed and mix it with locally available ingredients for them, dispose of the males and keep the females around.

Until recently, when for almost 3 months I did not see any new chick, despite having more than 42 actively laying hens. I decided to pay a close attention to what was going on, and discovered that rats had been feasting on the newly hatched chicks, and whenever a chick will hatch and wanders around away from the mothers nests, other hens will continue to peck it until it dies.

The law of diminishing returns had set in. Their population had reached a point where productivity goes down, unless special attention is given. I was very close to disposing everything, until I looked back on how stress free their upkeep had been. I have not lost a single grown chicken due to any disease in almost a year.

What if I can dedicate some time and really look at their economic productivity? Will that be a profitable venture? I have looked around and asked around, and the people that have kept a growing number of local chickens either said they are difficult to control or they simply don’t have enough space to rear them.

So join me as I take this journey. I’m bringing this here so we can all learn from each other. Your inputs are very welcome.

Here are some pics (I have attached only a couple pics but its saying “entry too large”

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Don't know much about animal husbandry but I know local chicken is in high demand will make u more money than "agric" fowl.

shortgun:
Don't know much about animal husbandry but I know local chicken is in high demand will make u more money than "agric" fowl.

Yes I’ve had talks with people that sell chicken, there are seasons when local chickens are very scarce, the supply is not consistent, so most of these suya spots now use young noilers as “local chicken”.

I fixed up my locally made semi-automatic incubator yesterday with some eggs from the farm. I will be accumulating the eggs weekly and then be doing staggered hatching in the incubator.

The first batch of eggs are in, I’m excited for the process.

I love this breed, look like the Fulani breed

Yes you can and you can sell at The Chicken Farm. Link for registration: www.thechickenfarm.com.ng/register/TCU20GOL4

Lombrozo:
I love this breed, look like the Fulani breed

Yes its the Fulani breed.

Breed Improvement/Cross-breeding.

The Nigerian local chicken genetic potential has remained largely unimproved. The average clutch size is 10-12 eggs, with at least 60 eggs yearly if its is allowed to brood and raise the chicks.

I have cross-bred a local hen with the American brahma rooster. The Brahma chicken is a large meaty breed with feathered legs. I will post the pictures below. Its taken a couple of generations of chickens for me to almost remove the “feathered-leg characteristics” of the cross-bred offsprings. I get a few of chicks that have feathered legs every now and then I realized they somehow outgrow it and it becomes almost non-visible.

The pictures below are of second generation. So they are 25% Brahma and 75% local breed. They are much larger than the local chicken and lay twice as much eggs.

This is what a Brahma chicken looks like:
Photo credit: Google (purely poultry website).

Nice

Are you an animal scientist brother or did you study any course related to animal production

Nice one. Wish u well. Hope to start mine soon

Adeoye007:
Are you an animal scientist brother or did you study any course related to animal production

No. Just passion, research and learning as I’m practicing.

sotech:
Nice one. Wish u well. Hope to start mine soon

Thank you. You should, so we can all learn from one another.

Wow, nice project. I wrote about how lucrative local birds are when I finished my OND years back. I discovered a woman sent her children to school depending majorly on local birds prodiction.

adefajosekayo:
Wow, nice project. I wrote about how lucrative local birds are when I finished my OND years back. I discovered a woman sent her children to school depending majorly on local birds prodiction.

Thank you. Thats interesting, I have heard stories about people buying cows from the proceeds as well. Do you raise local chickens now? And if you do, how has your experience been so far?

I mentioned that even though the second generation cross-breed I have no do not look exactly like the Brahma chicken, I do get some Feathered-leg chicks occasionally. I actually just got one chick that hatched with feathered-legs and I’ve attached the pic below.

I guess you can’t completely phase that feature out since its in their DNA, maybe eventually through selective breeding? Either way, once they mature and start to free-range, I have noticed the scales in their legs shed out the hair.

I’m looking forward to the hatching of the eggs in the incubator, so I can begin to document the weight, feed intake, and conversion ratio.

Hi , farouq, is it economically viable to rear ,brahman chicken. And how do i get in ilorin

Farouq94:
I fixed up my locally made semi-automatic incubator yesterday with some eggs from the farm. I will be accumulating the eggs weekly and then be doing staggered hatching in the incubator.

The first batch of eggs are in, I’m excited for the process.

With what do you powered your semi automatic incubator?

Farouq94:
I’m looking forward to the hatching of the eggs in the incubator, so I can begin to document the weight, feed intake, and conversion ratio.

are you selling those cross breeding ones

sotech:
Hi , farouq, is it economically viable to rear ,brahman chicken. And how do i get in ilorin

Brahma’s are exotic chickens, so they are mainly kept as pets or show birds. The people that buy them are the same set of people that will spend some couple hundred thousands on peacocks in their homes. So if you have that market close to you, breeding fancy chickens can be very lucrative.

I think I’ve seen a couple of threads here advertising these fancy chickens. You can check them out. Also you can check pages like Sufypets on instagram. In any case, do your due diligence, and if you have the connect and the market, you’ll make money breeding them.

jethro2:


With what do you powered your semi automatic incubator?

It has a fan that is be powered by solar/electricity 24/7.

The source of heat is a kerosene lamp outside the incubator. So the lamp is seated under a vent that has a fan, which sucks in the heat and distributes it across the five levels of the incubator.

Cool83:

are you selling those cross breeding ones

No I’m not selling. I’m using them for my research for now.

I love this your thread sir, am a chicken lover and like to keep them and like to spend time around with them.

Am a poultry farmer, I had try layer and it was successful. Since November last year I had been wanting to venture into this local chicken, I have been searching for land to rent here in ilorin, I got one but not fence thinking of doing bamboo fence but finance is holding be back. My strong passion for this project is not making me rest since it’s not achieve yet. This year mid May I decided to start with what I have , so I got a carton and six chicks and Started from my dinning room , I got more chicks so I have 13 now and I also got them cage and keep them in my backyard this month. I hope to get bigger farm before they become plenty.

Am skeptical about the duration of local birds maturity and the wight they achieve for business purpose,I think it will be nice if I can get a way to improve their weight to get more income so to complement the time and effort.

I will like this foreign birds for cross breeding too. I was thinking of crossing noiler with local chicken, but now I will not mind this Brahma too , and if their are other you can recommend too. Please, can you drop you contact so I can had you on WhatsApp .

Am unable to upload enough pictures, maybe I will try one after the other. Thanks

Yes, they are very lucrative. If you have space, because they stray and could easily be claimed by a neighbor, go for it. Thank me later.

GafarOlatunji:
I love this your thread sir, am a chicken lover and like to keep them and like to spend time around with them.

Am a poultry farmer, I had try layer and it was successful. Since November last year I had been wanting to venture into this local chicken, I have been searching for land to rent here in ilorin, I got one but not fence thinking of doing bamboo fence but finance is holding be back. My strong passion for this project is not making me rest since it’s not achieve yet. This year mid May I decided to start with what I have , so I got a carton and six chicks and Started from my dinning room , I got more chicks so I have 13 now and I also got them cage and keep them in my backyard this month. I hope to get bigger farm before they become plenty.

Am skeptical about the duration of local birds maturity and the wight they achieve for business purpose,I think it will be nice if I can get a way to improve their weight to get more income so to complement the time and effort.

I will like this foreign birds for cross breeding too. I was thinking of crossing noiler with local chicken, but now I will not mind this Brahma too , and if their are other you can recommend too. Please, can you drop you contact so I can had you on WhatsApp .

Am unable to upload enough pictures, maybe I will try one after the other. Thanks

Dear, you have done a pretty good job. However, please, take note that day-old local chicks do not require lattern or any heating system to keep warm.

You just need to keep them in a carton relative to their size and cover the carton at night. For instance, if you have about 12 chicks, a small indomie carton would do just fine. At night, you flip the lids over - almost ajar - not completely closed, and they will be fine.

For everyone's information, I have huge experience in raising local chickens as well as cross-breeding them to attain between 2.5 - 3kg in about 6-7months. However, I often don't have time to discuss my progress on this platform. I believe I will do that someday for a fee though.

It's been one of the most fascinating learning experience for me, but the learning curve has been really rewarding.

Good luck everyone!

GafarOlatunji:
I love this your thread sir, am a chicken lover and like to keep them and like to spend time around with them.

Am a poultry farmer, I had try layer and it was successful. Since November last year I had been wanting to venture into this local chicken, I have been searching for land to rent here in ilorin, I got one but not fence thinking of doing bamboo fence but finance is holding be back. My strong passion for this project is not making me rest since it’s not achieve yet. This year mid May I decided to start with what I have , so I got a carton and six chicks and Started from my dinning room , I got more chicks so I have 13 now and I also got them cage and keep them in my backyard this month. I hope to get bigger farm before they become plenty.

Am skeptical about the duration of local birds maturity and the wight they achieve for business purpose,I think it will be nice if I can get a way to improve their weight to get more income so to complement the time and effort.

I will like this foreign birds for cross breeding too. I was thinking of crossing noiler with local chicken, but now I will not mind this Brahma too , and if their are other you can recommend too. Please, can you drop you contact so I can had you on WhatsApp .

Am unable to upload enough pictures, maybe I will try one after the other. Thanks

You are on the right path already. You can actually attain a good weight cross-breeding with noilers. I’m also crossbreeding with them right now and their chicks gain weight faster than the normal local chick. So you don’t need the Brahma.

My only advice to you is to start small learn the process. You don’t necessarily need more than 10 chickens for a start, as you already know that local chickens are prolific breeders. When you have too many hens in one place and you don’t manage them well, you begin to have 2-3 hens sharing one nests, so one might lay 10 eggs, the other seeing too many eggs in the nest might lay one a few and then start brooding. So instead of you having say like 30 eggs, you’ll end up having 15 and that has already reduced your productivity.

Having many chickens sharing one nest will the bane of your breeding. You will have chickens abandoning their nests as soon as a couple of chicks start hatching, and leave the rest of the clutch causing chick death even before they hatch. I’ve had this issue too many times.

So even 5 hens and a male noiler are enough. Have enough nests for them and watch your chicken population grow. I started with less than ten, and I have over a hundred.

Btw your chickens look great. They have beautiful features- height, plumage..everything. Where did you get them?

jidestroud:
An interesting thread. Make I sidon here learn.

Thank you Sir, pleased to have you here. I enjoy your goat thread. It made me buy a few goats and keep on the farm. I’m looking forward to the outcome of that project.