Problems are Opportunities (3): Raise Chickens for Eggs and Meat

Another of Yolanda's aftermath is the sudden disappearance of a table essential: the ubiquitous egg that's good for breakfast, lunch or dinner. And when they appeared, they have become expensive and unaffordable to the lower consuming class.

This problem however is an opportunity for those with a small space especially with a small area that can produce enough grass for forage. You can then raise a few heads of chickens for its meat or if you have the right breed, for eggs. If you have a small space in your front or backyard and are also engaged in small gardening where you raise plants for aesthetics or for food, chickens are an essential part of your system. Their manure is the most ideal organic fertilizer you need.

Breeds to raise:

Depending on your interest, you can choose from the many breeds available. If you have an interest for game fowls whose offsprings you can fight or sell to cockfighters, they are most ideal in the Ilonggo setting where cockfights are popular event and many earn from raising a few heads right in the yard. For decades now, Iloilo and negros are known as the game fowl center of the country where people go to buy quality game fowls, even those raised by small breeders and backyard raisers who breed to sell at a lower price.

Many of the residents of Villa Arevalo and the municipality of Oton engage in small scale game chicken raising for livelihood. While the stags or the cockerels are sold, the extra pullets and the eggs often go to the household pot o nourish the ever demanding nutritional requirements of the children in the family. It is said that in Iloilo, it is more profitable to raise game chickens than pigs. Yolanda had wreaked havoc on the gamefowl industry of Western Visayas while other typhoons have destroyed thousands of roosters in Luzon to the point that the demand for cocks and stags have practically doubled.

For dual purpose breeds, meaning, for eggs and meat, there are foreign breeds which were once imported by private individuals and by government but a few had remained mainly due to acclimatization problems. There also exotic breeds like the Egyptian, Kabir, Sasso and other but they suffered the same fate. Local breeds or the native chickens have endured several centuries of culture as they are part of the home or farm system. They subsist on feeds that they can forage and from table scraps thrown to them. But their basic weaknesses are that they are slow growers and become broody after only about 8 eggs laid.

Lately, there had been renewed attention of oriental chickens, particularly, the aseel or popularly called jolo. Jolo breeds are often used for naked heel fighting or locally known as “pauwak” where roosters are fought for one hour 30 minutes and those that are still standing up and pecking, win. However, the merits of the jolo breed goes beyond its prowess to withstand beating for one hour and a half. These are extra large chickens where the cocks weigh between 2 to 4 kilograms while the hens weigh from 1.5 to 2 kilograms. They are foragers and can subsist on limited and poor feed availability. Given a free range, they can scrounge around eating almost anything edible, from fresh tender nutrient rich plants, to worms and insects which are sources of proteins and amino acids for them.

They are also fast growers where at 50 to 60 days old, they can be slaughtered and would yield about 1 kilogram of meat. Their biggest asset however is their hens' capability to sit and hatch well. They are also good mothers and are fiercely protective of their brood. However, when hungry, they will also kill and eat their own hatchlings. Like native chickens however, they become broody or stop laying eggs and start to sit on their eggs when they have laid about 12 eggs.

Like all breeds, the farmer should strive to improve the jolo breed continuously. If he wants to improve it for egg laying, he can identify good layers in the flock and breed them to white leghorn males who are often passed in the streets as excess broiler chickens. White leghorns are known to lay as much as 320 eggs per year and in one spurt, they can lay up to 50 eggs before stopping for a few days then backl again. (to be continued)