Meat Bird Project - Delaware, White Rock, Dark Cornish

[KoopOnTruckin]

I officially started my meat bird project this month. (Really I've been working on it MENTALLY for like 6 months, but I just got my chicks about a week and a half ago...)

Here is what I'm working with:

I ordered 25 birds from Welp Hatchery - 5 Dark Cornish (DC) cockerels, then 5 males and females each of Delawares (DEL) and White Rocks (WR). Unfortunately, Welp made a mistake and accidentally forgot to include my 5 WR pullets, so they sent me another 10 straight run WRs the following week (at no extra cost, THANKS WELP!!!).

With the extras they sent, I have 33 total:
5 DC cockerels
9 WR cockerels
7 WR pullets
5 DEL cockerels
7 DEL pullets

My plan is to keep the largest/healthiest rooster of each of the 3 breeds, and the largest/healthiest 4-5 hens from the WRs and DELs. This will give me a decent amount of eggs, and good breeding stock for a sustainable meat flock. I will then make DC x WR, DC x DEL, WR x DEL, DEL x WR, and of course pure WR and pure DEL. But I digress - I've been thinking "in the future" for 6 months already, now is the time to LIVE IN THE PRESENT! Back to reality -

For the first 10 days, I started them on 24% chick starter, then dropped them down to 22% (50/50 split with 20% starter/grower). So far, I've noticed that the Delawares are not growing as fast as the others - I expected them to grow a bit faster than the DCs, but not so much. The DELs are averaging 125 grams, the DCs 128.5g, and the WRs a WHOPPING 160g!

I weighed them all a few days after I received them, then at a week and 1.5 weeks, and the AVERAGE weights are below. I will continue to weigh them now weekly going forward:

3 days​

1 week​

1.5 wk​

DC
61.8g 84.4
128.6
DEL 60.4 81.6
124.9
WR 68.8 100.6 160

The WRs so far are growing much better and seem to have a better feed conversion rate - this is likely to change, and of course they are all in the same brooder so I can't tell if they're eating more than the others but it makes sense that they are. They are also all cockerels, since the pullets weren't shipped for another week. The WR pullets weighed in at an average of 65.7g at 3 days old, so still much better than the DELs and DC. I know it's premature since they are only about 13 days old, but I'm seeing a definite reason why WRs are the chosen breed to mix with Cornish.

In another 20 weeks when they're all old enough to breed, I will be able to get better numbers as I will only raise one breed at a time. I know DELs are supposed to be a bit more heat tolerant than the WRs, and in FL that was my first concern. But the tractor I will put them in has an insulated roof, will be in the shade, and should have plenty of circulating air to keep them from overheating.

 

[Baymule]

Very interesting project, I'll be checking in on you to see how it's going. I ordered 50 straight run Delawares and wound up with maybe 11 pullets. And to top it off, these Delawares have got to be the meanest durn chickens I've ever seen. I'm going to process ALL the cockerels this week and go find a RIR rooster so I can breed my own red sex links.

The White Rocks seem to be gaining the best for you. I've heard that they are calm, friendly birds, good layers and have a meaty carcass. I wish you the best in your breeding efforts!

 

[JenellYB]

For what it's worth... My experience raising meat and dual purpose chickens was 30-40 years ago, but I tried most of the most popular and commonly available breeds. I only ventured into Cornish Rocks, knowing nothing about their problems, and it was a horrible experience.

The breed that I kept going back to and eventually stuck with, all around the best, was White Rocks. Fast early growth for feed efficient meat birds, the hens made great layers of large to huge brown eggs, with a longer productive laying life than most the egg breeds. Good foragers which helps reduce feed costs, though not the most alert and watchful birds, so vulnerable to predators. But having a few of some other more watchful breed to keep watch and sound alarm helped that.

Temperament, personality, excellent. I never had an aggressive WR roo. Having a family with small children, that was important.

One more thing, I know the Plymouth Rocks are all supposed to be the same breed, with all the same traits, but that wasn't my experience. I also at times had the Barred Rocks, and they are quite different from White Rocks. They don't grow as fast, if meat is a consideration, and the personality seemed different to me. So whether I wanted to raise birds just for meat, or for dual use meat and eggs, White Rocks would be my first choice.

 

[Ulladh]

Dude, we need an update!

 

[Kiki]

I'm so glad to find somebody else doing the same thing as me! I just got 30 females who are now 5 days old and going strong. I have Black Australorps, Delawares, and New Hampshire Reds. My main goal is to develop a sustainable broiler flock and to do so, i imagine that i'll probably end up having about 4 different breeds to maintain which is a project in and of itself.

I don't have any cockerels (unless i received some mis-sexed) but I'm thinking about just ordering 15 or 25 from Murray McMurray hatchery because they have an option of ordering a random assortment of larger breed cockerels. It would be cool to try all sorts of breed and get real numbers and statistics. https://www.mcmurrayhatchery.com/all_heavies.html

I made up one spreadsheet to keep track of the development of each chick individually but haven't tagged them as of yet because I'm waiting for my wing tags to arrive from Ketchum Manufacturing http://www.ketchummfg.com/wing-bandear-tags-aluminum-numbered

Here's a link to the spreadsheet i developed if you'd like to see the data I have so far. You are more than welcome to keepp it and use it for yourself and modify as you please Also, any and all suggestions are welcome
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B8In3P9Jq5XKSDhmb2J0SWpqMjg

Awesome!

I am so excited to see you both do this "work" for me! I love it!

 

[Kiki]

I am surprised by how many people are NOT here watching this thread.
I am very excited about your results.
Very very interesting to me!

I highly recommend the FF.
I am by far not an expert but I did spend a good amount of time researching chickens before I got "into" them and I can't imagine why one would NOT feed fermented food.

If is not hard to do AT ALL.

 

[Kiki]

After searching through the forums a bit about two weeks ago, I stumbled across a great thread which includes an awesome financial tracking spreadsheet!
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/...or-tracking-expenses-and-income-from-chickens

thanks...i might be able to add a few things to this to make it work for me.

thank again.

 

[JenellYB]

Thank you for the experienced advice, I'm glad you had such a great experience with WRs! At this point I'm thinking the WRs will be my bird of choice, not too sure about the Dels but they may grow on me. And I'm thinking a DC roo will be a good watch-bird for predators, hopefully...

I have a 2 year old son, he's pretty good with the birds but temperament is definitely a consideration. I know a local breeder who recommended Dels for their temperament, she didn't have any at the time so I went with hatchery chicks. I assume her line of Dels are much better than the line I have, they're not "mean" necessarily but they don't hesitate to peck. They're very comfortable with people, they peck at my glasses, fly at me whenever I open the mobile pen, and are the first to find a way out to the other sections of the pen.

The DC are just all around good birds (so far) as well. They're all cockerels, with very even temperament and solid personalities. A bit skiddish, but that's mostly my fault since I don't hold them as often as I should. I'm going to make it a plan to go out and hold the larger ones a few times a day, as I'm likely not going to keep any of the small ones. Only one DC cockerel will make the cut, as well as one WR cockerel. Guess I should start holding all of the WR hens as well, since likely all of them will be around for a while.

BTW, I think ALL of the White Rocks, and most other chickens, I had over those years were from Ideal Hatchery, through one feed store here that I trust completely. I am presently raising my first decent sized flock in nearly 30 years, but not being interested in raising meat, I have 9 Golden sex links, 16 weeks, and 5 Ameraucanas,or at least what Ideal sells as that, 14 weeks. I bought them through that same feed store I've been dealing with about 50 yrs now, maybe longer.

My mention above about White Rocks not being very wary or watchful for danger, and having a few of some more watchful breed to sound alarm, I eventually settled on Ameracanas, I love their funny faces, they have lots of personality, flighty if not handled a lot young, and my kids and even other adults were just so amazed by the blue eggs. But a few of any more flighty breed are good. I remember even as a kid how many of our country kin that had chickens had, in addition to layers and any for meat, a little flock of game bantams around, for their watchfulness.

 

[Kiki]

BTW, I think ALL of the White Rocks, and most other chickens, I had over those years were from Ideal Hatchery, through one feed store here that I trust completely. I am presently raising my first decent sized flock in nearly 30 years, but not being interested in raising meat, I have 9 Golden sex links, 16 weeks, and 5 Ameraucanas,or at least what Ideal sells as that, 14 weeks. I bought them through that same feed store I've been dealing with about 50 yrs now, maybe longer.

My mention above about White Rocks not being very wary or watchful for danger, and having a few of some more watchful breed to sound alarm, I eventually settled on Ameracanas, I love their funny faces, they have lots of personality, flighty if not handled a lot young, and my kids and even other adults were just so amazed by the blue eggs. But a few of any more flighty breed are good. I remember even as a kid how many of our country kin that had chickens had, in addition to layers and any for meat, a little flock of game bantams around, for their watchfulness.

My Easter Eggers from Ideal...hatched 2 days ago....They are not true Ameracaunas....so I've been told a hundred times already.

 

[Kiki]

Here's the heaviest WR cockerel, he's also in the picture above in the back, just to the right looking away from the camera - I think he's a bit camera-shy! Super heavy though, he's over the 1 lb mark. Only one WR male weighs less than 1 lb, he's only 13 oz. Collectively, all 21 of the older chicks weigh 17 lbs.


Here's the heaviest DC, he doesn't look very heavy but he definitely has some mass to him. Reminds me of a softball.




They really seem to enjoy their coop. I'm likely going to put the younger WRs out there in the next couple of days, but I just cleaned their bedding this morning so I'll wait until it needs to be changed first. At that point, I will likely start using all 3 pens of the mobile coop. Any thoughts on how I should separate them? Here are some of my ideas:

1:
24 sf - all 5 DEL males, 4 WR males, and 5 DC males
15 sf - all 11 younger WR mixed
9 sf - all 7 DEL females
I'm worried that this may pose a problem as they get older, keeping too many roos together in the big pen may start a "comb-measuring contest".

2:
24 sf - The potential "Keepers", 2 DC males, 2 WR males, 2 WR females, 2 DEL males, and 2 DEL females
15 sf - remaining 11 males
9 sf - remaining 10 females
This gives the keepers more room to spread their wings (HEY, I get that now!!) but keeps the others contained so their meat is potentially more tender.

3:
24 sf - 15 mixed WRs
15 sf - 12 mixed DELs
9 sf - 5 DC males
This makes the most sense to me, gives them equal amounts of room (roughly...), and is an easy way to keep them separated. Only the DCs would be without females.

I would pick option 3.
Quick glance and you see who's who in each area.."the biggest"