*Certain chicken breeds have become extinct and more are about to become extinct.
*There are about 25 billion chickens in the world today but more traditional or ‘heritage’ breeds are increasingly at risk of becoming extinct.
*This is because industrialized chicken farming and factory farming bred in qualities to enhance meat and egg production. Little care or thought is given to the original breed.
*This is an important notice for us to wake up and it is also why we should raise rare breeds (and common breeds also).
*We should care about and save rare and heritage breeds because they carry generations of history, unique traits, and genetics that we have to preserve. *Preserving rare chickens helps protects them and keeps their traits and genetics alive.
If you need more information on saving, raising, or learning about heritage breeds of chickens; here are some quotes from Mother Earth News, a very reputable source, about saving heritage breeds:
The ALBC’s watchlist for endangered livestock classifies rare breeds as “critical” (global population less than 2,000), “threatened,” “watch” and “recovering.” The system is slightly different for rabbits and poultry. In addition to numbers of animals, there are other criteria for the classifications.
Each breed of livestock has unique traits, though they may not be as productive as breeds that industrial agriculture depends most heavily on. “The productive life of a Holstein cow is between three and four years,” according to the Holstein association. But many heritage breeds, such as Dutch Belted cows, are often productive into their teen years. Dutch Belted cows are efficient milk producers on a grass-based diet with little additional grain. And grass-fed cattle produce milk with important health benefits to humans. Click here and here for more information.
When you raise heritage breeds, you won’t simply preserve history, you’ll experience it. And we don’t know what the future may bring. When a heritage breed becomes extinct, we lose the unique genetic traits of that breed and the gene pool shrinks. Of course, we’ll never know what beneficial traits might die with a rare breed.
If you need more information, you can read the rest of the article here:
https://www.motherearthnews.com/homesteading-and-livestock/why-you-should-care-about-heritage-breeds/
You will need a subscription but it’s cheap considering the amount of information that they give on their website.
Little Rock Poultry 