Meat chickens are fast and easy imo. 8 weeks start to finish and you can just do deep bedding. Build an easily movable coop and you can store it when not in use.
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You say you’re in a small space, and want no inputs. There’s a pretty strong correlation between low population density and ability to forage most of the diet. If you had meat scraps it might be possible to set up a fly bucket for chickens to supplement garden plant stuff and the bugs from a smaller foraging area, but that relies on having a source of meat scraps and some great predator control. If you don’t have a large space for them to range over, and bugs available on that space year-round, it’s more difficult.
I’ve found quail need a ton of protein to lay well and to not eat each other, so I wouldn’t recommend them unless you had extra feed. They do really lay a ton of eggs and they make lovely noises, plus they keep greenhouses pretty bug-free with less damage to plants (as long as you manage their timing, and keep their population density low).
For rabbits or other plant-eating critters, you do need to maintain quality of plants for them through the year; if you’re very seasonal and on a small space where you can’t create hay that can be a challenge.
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That is a very interesting point. My cultural comfort zone says, “Urghhhh!” My practical side says, “It might be a good idea to get over yourself.”
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Hah, interesting, thanks for sharing. My first question is… I wonder how you kill them humanely? The older I get the harder it is for me to kill things!
Good idea-- what about bringing in scraps/compost from somewhere local to feed animals? I had friends that would pickup local compost from restaurants for their chickens and pigs. A neighbor of mine now gets spent grain dropped off all the time. Maybe there’s somewhere near you that wants to have their waste stream dealt with, and you could use it for something like black soldier flies for chickens.
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Have you looked into Guinea fowl? They’re way easier and wilder than chicken (they free range and don’t get sick) and very delicious. They’re common in France where I come from. They forage most of their food. You could supplement them with growing soldier bug, sprouts and chickweed all of which you can grow without garden space really. I’ve been thinking about raising them myself, not to eat them but to control my unreal tick population. I’ve no direct experience (aside from eating them in France). They’re more gamey in taste than chicken but very gourmet and delicious. Not sure about them in your climate though, you’d have to research that part.
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A caution with guinea fowl (and muscovies) is that they’ll fly to the neighbour’s yard, and they make specific noises. In a high density living situation you’d want to be on very good terms with your neighbours to try them. They will probably eat the cat and dog food of your neighbours within ten houses, poop on your neighbours’ roofs, etc.
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I’m on a program that takes expired food from the grocery store once a week. It’s a great source of abundance, which of course also has some downsides. In my case it replaces some feed costs with enormous time handling packaging garbage. I feed the meat to my dogs now; when I tried a fly bucket it was such an enormous predator draw that it wasn’t worth it, for me. I keep it up because the produce is amazing for the geese in winter, and because the meat for the dogs and dairy for the pigs is worthwhile. I imagine there’s a wide range of agreements that are possible.
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Yes! That’s true! They are very noisy also.
Thanks for that informative answer, Katie! I didn’t know half that about the history of chickens.
We are selecting the best layers from our Blue Australorp/Chantecler/Barred Rock/Dominique chickens. We are crossing these up, but maybe we should be adding in some old wild genetics for more foraging ability and mothering instincts.
We use a trap nest to select the hens that lay the best in winter. I know we are already getting more eggs than the old breeds ever gave, but we want to have relatively dependable production to please our modern customers who are used to having what they want 24/7/365. The old books I have checked out report about 125 to 150 eggs per year for many breeds.
I hope I’m not hijacking the post since I am not offering much help to you, Emily. I also agree with the suggestions for rabbits as being one of the best animals for your situation. With good genetics you should soon be able to have them outside year round. My son uses a movable cage that has a 12 inch strip of wire mesh around the inside, flat on the floor, to keep them from digging out.
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Oh for sure! We have the same mix here + cougars. No animals are 100% safe on their own and require human involvement to protect them. I’ve even seen full-size horses (not mine) with cougar injuries, thankfully not severe though.
With my own birds, I let them free-range in the daylight hours and they’re locked in a predator-proof coop from dusk to dawn when the canines/felines and owls are active. They stick close to plant cover while ranging and spend a great deal of time in our woods.
You’re very welcome - I’m kind of a chicken nerd!
My best broody hen was a Partridge Chantecler. Game breeds are also excellent mothers and could be a good option if you’re looking for more mothering traits. Dorkings are also excellent broodies.
Most hatcheries will describe the smaller breeds as non-setters, but breeders of them will tell you otherwise. I know breeders of Campines and Anconas that find they’ll go broody if conditions are right. I had a Hamburg go broody once when she was an older hen - she was an extremely ferocious and dedicated mother!
I’m all for mixing up chicken breeds! The more the merrier.
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Landrace everything!
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No worries. If the thread wanders away slightly, it’s all still very interesting information that will be valuable to people on this thread. 
In terms of rabbits, how prone are they to interbeeding depression? How long would it take, if keeping only two rabbits as a breeding pair through each winter, before the rabbit genetics started to be so weak that I would need to get a new influx of genes to counteract those issues?
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I am not an expert on genetics and animal breeding, but I believe it is important to start with a diversity of genetics, as in plant landraces; and if you do that you can go with that population for years without getting new stock.
Daniel Salatin’s rabbits have been the same genetics for decades with no new blood coming in, I believe.
But the way I approach it is to bring in a variety of breeding stock from different sources in the first several years to widen the base. Just like we make a plant grex.
However, with only two rabbits I guess you would have to add new genetics eventually.
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Very easy solution
Step 1: Tell all your neighbors/friends how easy it is to keep chickens/rabbits
Step 2: Get bees
Step 3: Barter the honey for eggs/meat with the neighbor/friend who now has chickens/rabbits
Maarten
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Worth looking into RHDV including RHDV2 (rabbits) and avian flu (any birds) including prevalence in your area and local laws, and giving some thought to that. The ethics are a little different with plants and animals around disease.
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We had guinea fowl for a couple of years, and they’re highly entertaining and delicious as well. One of them even formed a romantic attachment to my cat (they would stare at each other for hours through the glass door, though I would guess the cat was thinking, “Lunch!”). We had to give up on them eventually because they all either got eaten by predators (they roosted in the trees and predators would wait for them at the bottom of the tree) or wandered off down the road and got hit by cars or just couldn’t find their way back. The only people I know who have succeeded with guinea fowl did it by clipping their wings, which we could never bring ourselves to do.
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No need to subject your animal populations to inbreeding. If you have neighbors that keep chickens or rabbits, it’s simple to ask them for siring services. Or bring in an outside sperm donor every generation to avoid inbreeding.
I like chickens much more than rabbits. Chickens seem to be heartier. Oh duh! I’ve only raised (inbred) breeds of rabbits. My chickens are barnyard mix.
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I had a thought. Would a bug breeding kit like what was mentioned above be a good way to feed laying chickens?
Guinea pigs are commonly raised for meat in South America. There are restaurants where you can pick the one you want them to cook for you!
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