Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Tinyheavyistiny]

I looked on the wiki and I didn't find any information about whether or not chickens graze.

[MonkeyHead]

Not grazers. Hence why eggs are quite OP as a food source.

[Tinyheavyistiny]

So I could create massive underground farms with just chickens?

[MonkeyHead]

... and enough nest boxes.

[Xinael]

Turkeys have a higher average egg count though, which makes them better for farming. There's a table on the wiki somewhere comparing average egg count, size (for meat and leather) and time to grow into adults for the different domesticated egg-laying birds, but I can't find it now.

[Telgin]

Turkeys are pretty broken as a food source.  10-15 turkeys fed 100+ in my last fort almost exclusively.  All of this from within a single room with 15 or so nest boxes.

[Fluoman]

Embark with 9 Turkey hens + 9 plump helmet spawns = fastest food overflow I managed.

[Larix]

Turkeys have a higher average egg count though, which makes them better for farming. There's a table on the wiki somewhere comparing average egg count, size (for meat and leather) and time to grow into adults for the different domesticated egg-laying birds, but I can't find it now.

But that's just for when you in an inexplicable fit of sanity want to take only _one_ type of fowl. And why do that, when you can have a full flock of chickens, one of ducks, one of geese, one of turkeys, one of guineafowl and one of peafowl? And if you place some cage traps and get lucky, you can add ravens and keas as well as emus to the mix. Good thing psittacosis and other zoonoses haven't been introduced yet...

[Uggh]

But that's just for when you in an inexplicable fit of sanity want to take only _one_ type of fowl. And why do that, when you can have a full flock of chickens, one of ducks, one of geese, one of turkeys, one of guineafowl and one of peafowl? And if you place some cage traps and get lucky, you can add ravens and keas as well as emus to the mix. Good thing psittacosis and other zoonoses haven't been introduced yet...

That's how my last fort "died". Assembling a large collection of any bird (and other egg layers) I could get my hands on, FPS went down until the game was not playable anymore. Nevertheless, I still love the idea of providing the greatest possible variety of food.

[vanatteveldt]

You can reduce FPS issues a bit by using cages. Only the egg layers need to be in a pasture, so you can put the males and the chicks in cages, and when the chicks are grown either butcher them straight from the cage or move them to the pasture.

[Garath]

and just destroy any meal that isn't a masterwork to reduce item clutter

[Szkeptik]

Do chickens actually eat anything? I mean I could understand if they ate seeds, but I never saw any indication that they eat at all.

[Laurin]

If you watch closely, you can see some sort of vermin spawning and dissappearing around poultry. They are supposed to pick worms and stuff, I think.

[Telgin]

Yeah, chickens are supposed to be eating vermin I believe.  Like in reality: chickens can largely feed and care for themselves.

The trouble is, the game doesn't realize that 25 chickens in a 10x10 room 500 feet underground probably couldn't.  It just completely removes the need for them to eat, just like any other non grazing animal.

[Fluoman]

Would chicken/turkeys etc allow us to ignore the need for cats? I was told no, but i never actually tried.