Cornish Cross Reviews

I'm really torn on what I feel about the breed. They were very active when they were a couple weeks old and then they just got so heavy that they didn't do much moving at all. I constantly had to clean them up because they would lay right next to the feeder in their poo. So they got regular baths to clean them up. They could only take a couple steps and had to sit down for a while. I found this very heart breaking that they couldn't have "normal chicken lives" We feed them flock raiser for 5 weeks and the last 3 weeks we switched to meatbird food. (No Hormones or Antibiotics) But when it came to slaughter this last weekend. The breast meat was huge!! I've never seen breast meat that big. We cooked it up that night and tasted great. And had enought left over from one breast to serve about 4 people. I don't like dark meat so this breed is perfect. but it is just so hard to watch them live like that.

I love this breed! In just 6 to 8 weeks they are ready to be processed and eaten. They are very calm and easy to care for. Just watch out for legs problems.

i recommend this breed

 I had two a male a female I dind't know they had such a short life I hear they are to be culled at 6 to 8 weeks but I think they could live longer the trouble with them is they grow so fast and as this is their legs have problems they lay around a lot but still get leg problems. This is why I had to cull both at 5 and 6 months old. The male got a bad limp I was trying to get him better but on advice saying if her could get better it would only happen again so then the fmale was not long after she started to linp and fromhaving the mae I knew her time came. The male ws very freindly but the female was not.

  Miss them still

Rhayden

Okay, I'm coming to this sideways. I picked up 3 "blonde chicks" and was told that they were Buff Orpingtons, but their shape was wrong and their color didn't develop correctly ether. Then I was told that they were perhaps red splash Wyandottes. I have have Silver-laced Wyandottes and these are not Wyandottes. They are hard-feathered, long-necked birds closer in shape to the Game Birds. They are still growing, but very boxy in shape with a long neck and small head. Pea combed, yellow legs. The friendliest chicks I started out with, one of them has turned out to be an aggressive pecker. I'm keeping hens for eggs, I feel these may fall short of the mark. They are the guard dogs of my flock, and the policemen.

*this review is mostly for the jumbo version of this breed*

Great birds for eating..growth rate is amazing!

Do not buy these birds as pets. They are bred for eating and to not do so within 12 weeks is in my opinion, cruel. They grow very fast and if kept past 12 weeks or so get grotesquely huge. They can be amusing in that they are dumb as rocks and have no fear of humans or for that matter anything else.

I am not sure where I stand on these.  I raised a few last year and they did their job, but their "chickeness" is gone.  They grew so fast that they were half bald for their entire life.  They couldn't fly and ran awkwardly.  These things both repelled me and made me laugh.  But in 10 weeks they were in my freezer.

I will raise again this year with some Dixie Rangers to compare.

I raised 52 meat birds in the spring of 2011. This was the first time I raised chickens, so I spent a lot of time doing research. I learned quickly that they are hungry all the time. A few of them would not leave the feeder until the food was gone. One developed slight leg problems because it just grew so fast. After a couple of days he recovered, but I've heard of a lot of people who weren't so lucky. The only other issue I encountered was that they were ALWAYS right under foot in the chicken yard and coop because they know that I = food.