Meaties 101

[Brunty_Farms]

To the Mods:

I think this should be stickied to the top.... I think it was meant to but from the looks of it someone stickied my post in there twice....

 

[Nifty-Chicken]

Great idea. We've added it to the "Notable Archives" sticky topic at the top of this section!

 

[Wynette]

Excellent thread. I'll be getting some meaties this year for the first time, though I am not going to get CX's. I'm going to get colored rangers. Anywho - I wanted to add that when using heat lamps, it's always a most excellent idea to get a lamp dimmer - it's on a cord & plugs into the wall, then you plug your heat lamp into it. THis way, you do not have to raise & lower your heat lamps...just slide the dimmer. Works like a charm!

 

[rickerra]

Great thread! Bump to the top... for those that didn't catch it in the 'Meat Section Notable Archives'.

I've got my first 'meat buggers' batch in the brooder!

Cheers!

 

[Sundown_Farmer]

AlbionWood,

In spring in central Illinois, "normal" is in the 20s to low 40s at night, 40s to low 90s daytime. Lots of wind though, I'm looking across miles of flat prairie surrounded by miles of flat prairie so the wind gets a good shot at me. Spring winds are often 15-25 mph and we had gusts to about 50 recently. The wasps and flies find shelter from the wind on the north and east sides of my house (where the doors are). Wetness varies a lot, some years it rains almost continuously and others it's fitful; average is 36 inches. In Spring it's often windy and drizzly, punctuated by occasional, massive downpours and tornadoes (just North of us last night). They are saying we might get snow here next week. No big deal. Soon the buffalo gnats will start hatching and we'll stop going outside for about a month.

Cornish Cross seem to handle the extreme variation in temperature very well but the gnats are deadly. We kept them in the brooder until they were 3 weeks old and well feathered then out into the cold, dark night they went. It gets windy enough here that we have to take precautions that the lids of the chicken tractors don't fly away. But the chickens themselves are performing very well in spite of cold, windy, wet nights.

Can't help you with the dry pasture problem. Seems like a chicken tractor passing over a piece of ground once/year would help more than hurt but don't really know your situation.

 

[TeriS]

I have 25 jumbo cornish crosses- they are now 10 days old. How big will they be at about 10 weeks of age? The tractor supply company we bought them from said they'd go through about 120 pounds of food (total for 25 chicks), then they'd be ready and about 6-8 pound average. Would this be about 10 weeks? My husband and I are brand new to meat birds.....please advise- Thanks!

 

[bigredfeather]

Quote:
As with most TSC employees who don't raise chickens, he isn't correct (if he does raise them and only feeds them 5 pounds of feed, they would look like leghorns, LOL). 25 of them will go thru around 500 pounds in 8 weeks if fed a restricted amount or 12 with food/12 without. At the 8 week mark I feed mine 1/2 a pound each everyday, so if you go ten weeks, I would add at least another 125 pounds to the 500 for a total of over 600 pounds. By ten weeks they should be at least 6-8 pounds dressed on a higher protein feed. IMHO it is best to shoot for a little smaller birds your first time. If you overfeed them, you may end up with some of them dieing prematurally near the end. Once you get the hang of it you will know how to push them a little harder to get larger birds without risking them overeating.

There is a bit of a learning curve for this breed, so don't get discouaged if you have some problems your first time. We have all expirienced it.
Goodluck!

 

[TeriS]

Thanks! So when would you advise having the birds processed- around 8 weeks or so? We actually got them to try to get cheaper meat for our freezer- we thought it would be great if they ate 3 bags of feed- I was estimating about 52 cents per pound of chicken! Including cost of chicks, processing and feed....I'll have to revise my cost per pound!

 

[bigredfeather]

Quote:
That's when I do mine. You should have a range of weights from 4-6 pounds in that amount of time. Raising your own typically isn't for a cheaper bird, it's for a better quality bird. My cost last year was $.92/pound, which isn't too bad. That being said, I buy over 100 chicks at a time and buy my feed in bulk from my mill, both of these things lower my cost per pound.

 

[TeriS]

Wow- I sure wish I could buy my feed in bulk!!
8 weeks will work for me then- thanks so much!