I do not understand the mathematics behind the dilemma. I’m assuming only the firts chicks cost money, because down the line they will breed.
But feeding them, housing them - vitamins and doctoring costs a lot of money.
So anyone with couple or more chickens - how much does it cost to have them on the table? And realistically how many eggs do you get?
I was thinking about them in the historical setting. They just piled up kitchen scraps and other organic waste (there was basically very little non organic waste back then) and they just let it pile up. Chickens were a huge part of managing it, it became basically zero waste circle.
I’m not going to jump into farming anytime soon - I have enough problems just trying to keep some sorrel saplings alive. I haven’t managed it yet. But thankfully I still have some seed left…